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HARVEY M. SHELLEY 
PUBLISHER AND BOOKSELLER 


5513 Larchwood Avenue 
Philadelphia 









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THE SAINT AND 
THE SWORD 














and the 


SWORD 


A SERIES OF ADDRESSES - 
ON THE ANTI-CHRISTIAN 
NATURE OF WAR 


By HERBERT BOOTH 
(An AMBASSADOR FOR JESUS CHRIST) 
Author of “The Christian Confederacy” 
“The Wiles of the Devil,’ “Toys and Their Teaching” 
“How Militarism Murders Christ,’ etc., etc. 


“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the 
flesh: For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but 
mighty through God.” (2 Cor. 10:3, 4.) 





NEW @8&% york 
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 


ee ee eee ee ee eee ORee enna nee eeen One enEET Ee HOR eR eeS TOR ene ee en ee ae nee nna naa E eee eeeeeeen ana enone sennes sen aaeseneunessesorasence® 


CopyricHT, 1923 
By HERBERT BOOTH 


To the Memorp of 
Hilp Beloved Father and Mother 
GENERAL WILLIAM BOOTH 


AND 


CATHERINE BOOTH 


Who taught me when a boy that the Gospel of Christ 

and the weapons of love were the all essential and 

successful equipments for the Soldier of the Cross 
in the good fight of faith. 


Qnd also to the Memory of 
Hp beloved Father-in-law 
THe LATE 
CARL FERDINAND SCHOCH 


Who when a young officer in the Netherlands army 

gave his heart to God and, at the dictate of an 

enlightened conscience, as in obedience to the com- 

mand of his Saviour, sacrificed his fortune and sur- 

rendered the sword of steel to take up the sword 
of the Spirit. 


This Book is Lovingly Medicated 





“One of the greatest employments of every Christian gov- 
ernment and community is to train thousands of men, not 
to fight with their fists only, in the way of inflicting a few 
passing sores, but with weapons capable, it may be, of killing 
human beings at the rate of so many per minute. It is quite 
a ‘scientific taste’ to study how to destroy a large vessel, with 
several hundreds of men on board, instantaneously. Talk of 
brutality! Is there anything half as brutal as this within 
the whole range of rowdyism? But against all this, modern 
Christianity, which professes to believe the teaching of Him 
Who taught us not to resist evil, but to love our enemies, 
and to treat with the utmost benevolence hostile nations, 
has nothing to say. All the devilish animosity, hard hearted 
cruelty, and harrowing consequences of modern warfare, 
are not only sanctioned but held up as an indespensable 
neccessity of civilized life, and in times of war, patronized 
and prayed for in our churches and chapels, with as much 
impudent assurance as though Jesus Christ had taught, “But 
I say unto you an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, and, 
return evil for evil, hate your enemies and pursue them with 
all the diabolical appliances of destruction which the Devil 
can enable you to invent.” 


CATHERINE BooTH. 


The Mother of the Salvation Army in “Popular Christianity,” 
pages 134-5. 





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ae dec 


CONTENTS 


PESTS # NOT Ry a ie Cre tetas lots aie bie wh ela als eae: 
TREVORDI Ti cie eb oeoele a shale Wiehe UEP HUSrO PING ytUW te, aN ale UR vy, 
PREPRODUCTION? ciicda sates ei thai iee PERRIS, btn Dt We ANN 
Part [I 
War 1s ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE, FOR THE CHURCH 
PTETS POR BIDDE Nye atc lol Cia elas be eh hw 
. Carnal War is forbidden for ie hunch be- 
cause it is out of its proper time....... 


2. Carnal War is forbidden for the Chard ee 
cause she is told to fight with the weapons of 
NOME PRS EOC ed eet oe ita oe ae tas Whale help 


Part II 
War is ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS ANTI- 
JUDICIAL 06) 6. a Oe 66: 81/6. 856-0 (670, 8.8 SC 2 @ FC 418Ce), SOO 7S). ORS 


Part III 

War 1s ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS IMMORAL.. 
1. Its rules and standards legalize and popularize 
Re PUM co P Vets Yate ote Whee] o apes lay ania: shea 

2. Its weapons are deceitful and cruel........... 
3. The actual uses made of these weapons are still 
WEPERPETTFICTALISCLALD C1 a gig altel cl oan te, oa tesa dar tze a ei 

4. War is immoral because it condones murder... 
5. War is immoral because it condemns itself.... 
6. War is immoral because it appeals to hatred and 
Rerenek. Ceth eda g a BAYS pe a AG ae 

7. War is immoral because it forces those to fight 
who have no real quarrel.......... SA ae 

8. War is immoral because it demoralizes those 
who are engaged in it.......... hie EY A 


Part IV 
War 1s ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE, FOR THE CHRIS- 
RIAN TPIS) (UNPATRIOTIC «515 cro: cusps Gig ohe\biels° 


3 


PAGE 


41 


41 


84. 


105 


219 


CONTENTS 


. Because it is detrimental to his Earthly Home- 


Rat ie ee eee 2 elk lee ee eee eee 


. Because it violates the laws of his Heavenly 


Cifizenship (utp. . 6 yn) tela ete ena ee 


. Because for the Christian to destroy his fellow- 


Christian is the highest form of treason to 
Christ 1 /u/o lin 'chs eaters ate ane ete Rina age 


. Because it is an act of flagrant disloyalty to the 


Bible for Christians to kill and die for Nations 
already doomed to destruction............. 


. Because it can never be right for the Christian to 


employ wicked means even for securing a 
good end (o's). sce settee miatiie Sh) yap vi ae aa 


Part V 


Waris ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS PROHIBITED 


BY THE TEACHINGS AND EXAMPLE OF CHRIST 
As SHOWN By:— 


; The Qualities He esteemed... 2.550. 0-2 am 


2. The) Parables He used. i.). . ox: scrap iene 
3. The Works He performed and the policy He 


laid down) .) cid Te lorie ot ds in ee 


. The Injunctions He uttered and the Reproofs 


He administered |... 6c sen 1 eee 


. The Gospel He preached and the conduct He 


condemned |. )e4 istaed cea pate oe 


. The Service He demanded and the Plan He 


explained #) 0) SSC Pale ace ne 


. The Endowments He bestowed and the Com- 


forter He promised iin << .\s.0 ++ ss clean anes 


. The Kingdom He introduced..............- 


9. The Methods He emphasized and the Tests He 


10. 


applied (o5°s\.'s's vielsle «tele slike orp ak ea eee 
The Example He gave... <i... +0 sin seemmieees 


PAGE 


232 


255 


272 


275 


od tae 


291 


294 
298 


WAR ARGUMENTS ANSWERED 


In this book the following arguments for war have been 
carefully answered. 

Abraham’s slaughter of the Kings. 63 to 69. 

Joshua and Jewish precedents. 42 to 62. 

“The Sword of the Lord.” 59 to 60. 

The ‘Cloak and Sword” passage. 24 and 70 to 79. 

Peter and the soldier Cornelius. 79 to 83. 

“My Country’s defence 95 and 235 to 238. 255 to 260. 
288 and 328 and 336. 

The “Burglar Wife and Daughter” argument. 96 to 100. 

The Police Force argument. 119 to 103. 

Defence of ‘‘Little Nations.” 125 to 127. 275 to 277. 

Sacredness of treaties. 128 to 130. 

The “powers that be’ argument. 130 to 132. 

Paul’s appeal to Ceasar. 132 to 133. 

Merciful Red Cross contrivances. 33 to 34. 161 to 173. 

Chaplains Opportunities for doing good. 34 and 173 to 186. 

Avenging of wrongs. 190 to 192. 

Good people in the armies. 202 to 204. 

The “Patriotic” argument. 219 to 271. 

The “war passages” in the Roman, Timothy, Titus and 
Peter Epistles. 25 and 260 to 265. 

The “law abiding citizens’ argument. 265 to 269 and 
335. 

The “Cromwell, Washington, Lincoln and Righteous 
Wars” argument. 278 to 287. 

The “democracy and war to end war” argument. 286 
to 288. 

The “king counting the cost of war” argument. 298 to 
300. 

The “strong man armed” argument. 300 to 302. 

The “‘Good Samaritan” argument. 302 to 304. 

“Render to Ceasar things that are Ceasar’s’ argument. 
308 to 309. 

5 


6 WAR ARGUMENTS ANSWERED 


“T came to bring a sword.” 319. 

The “Marriage Feast” argument. 324. 

David and Goliath argument. 331. 

Elijah and Baal’s Prophets. 331. 

The cleansing of the Temple. 24 and 332 to 334. 
The “Militant Christ” argument. 337 to 342. 


THE FoLttow1inc ArE ALso DEALT WITH IN THE Book: 


“How MuirarisM Murpers CHRIST.” 


Present Pages 


Christ. before : Cataphis.’/icieero is see eee ee 13 to 
War's unitying: influence «.\\.<stiscieteuiem ae eee Sy as 
Minister's; exemptions, J). cif ae ate eke eater Telit: 
Cegsar’s claims on Christians. sau wer eee ee 23 ve 
Individual wrong and national righteousness...... Batty 
The Red Cross and the True Cross Societies...... Ginn 
Abe? Big Bully’> arguments). seus cee takes ALA: 
Self defence argument. (2014). 4oe a ednisic ce ienens 46030 


“Fight for the Fatherland” argument........... 49 


ae 


AUTHOR’S NOTE 


This book was written during the Great War. It was 
prepared as a protest and a testimony which, had the United 
States Government so decreed, the writer cheerfully offered 
to seal with his imprisonment. 

It was offered to a number of publishers likely to be in- 
terested in the subject. Some of these at first took it up 
enthusiastically but later, in face of ever tightening legisla- 
tion, withdrew. As a last resort the writer had the manu- 
script put into type hoping to distribute the book through 
the mails. But this avenue, too, was quickly closed and 
there were indications that the first impressions would be 
seized by Secret Service Agents. 

Nothing remained, therefore, but to hold it over till the 
rage for militarism, ever the silencer of conscience and the 
destroyer of freedom of speech, had subsided. 

A four years’ campaign of continuous Missions in Aus- 
tralasia has rendered it impossible to make the necessary cor- 
rections for bringing it to date until the present time. 

The stern logic of events since the signing of the armistice 
has abundantly confirmed what I have written. The Church 
of the Living God if she is to be effective in opposing war 
must take her eyes off the schemes of unregenerate men, try- 
ing to save themselves from the strife which is the inevitable 
consequence of their selfish natures, and she must concen- 
trate her efforts on bringing her own children into line with 
the teachings and spirit of her divine Lord. 

What is most needed, to bring about a League of Nations 
or a World Court is a League of Thoroughly Christianized 
Christians, gathered from the midst of every Denomination, 
pledged to preach and practice the principles of Christ, and 
ready to give notice to all governments that, unless they can 
discover some better way of settling their disputes than the 
barbaric method of war, they may reckon, not only on its 


7 


8 AUTHOR'S NOTE 


constitutional opposition but on its refusal to participate in 
any military service whatsoever or in any service at all where 
the gospel of love cannot be preached. While the govern- 
ments know they can rely on the sanctions and support of 
the Church in times of war they are not likely to pay much 
attention to their preachments of pacifism im times of peace. 

I now send forth this book with prayer that it may help 
some of the Lord’s true people to get, as regards this vital 
subject, better anchored to God’s Word, and thus prepared. 
for the days of violence still ahead and which the Lord 
Jesus predicted should herald His return. 


HERBERT BOOTH. © 
An Ambassador for Christ. 
rH Cor.V 720: 


Yonkers-on-Hudson, N. Y. 
August, 1923. 


FOREWORD 


es is a red-hot book on a blazing-hot theme. I 
make no apologies to any one for handling my subject 
without ambiguity or compromise. If ever, in all the 
world’s history, there was a time when it was vitally im- 
portant to be definite and fearless, this is the moment. 


As a CHRISTIAN speaking to CHRISTIANS I re- 
gard war as no subject to be dealt with in a ginger-bread, 
half-frightened, apologetic, may-it-not-be-possible-that-I-am- 
right-and-you-are-wrong fashion. ‘That is no way for a man 
to deal with what he considers legalized murder. For 
“pussy-foot’ pacifist literature I refer the reader elsewhere. 

At a time when the Christian Church is tumbling over 
itself to secure the services of men who, in evangelistic cam- 
paigns, employ the most extravagant slang; breathe out 
denunciations little short of swearing in their attacks on 
dancing, theater-going and booze, one who, with General 
Sherman, regards war as hell itself, may be permitted 
to strike straight from the shoulder when talking about that 
same hell let loose. Especially so when “great Church 
leaders’ are busy trying to prove that such ghastly hell- 
ishness finds in some way its causes, as its approval away 
up in heaven. If drunkenness is a crime, what shall be 
said of the crime which has turned half of Europe into a 
quagmire of youthful corpses—a shambles running with hu- 
man blood—over which the bishops of the world have been 
holding forth holy hands in benediction! 


The fact that hitting “booze,” dancing, card-playing, 
theater-going, no longer involves, as it used to for some of 
us, a boycotted business or a broken nose, while hitting 
war means the organized opposition of most of the forces 


9 


10 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


of earth and all the powers of hell, is a pretty sure indica- 
tion that, in this hour, war is the thing to hit. 


The Line of Attack 

Note carefully, however, this book is not an attack on 
earthly governments. It is an attack on the pugilistic Chris- 
tianity of the modern Church. The governments of this 
age are not Christian governments. The vast majority of 
their subjects know nothing of the “new birth” which, Christ 
said, was the first essential to citizenship in His kingdom. 
Being under the rule of Satan, they are not subject to Chris- 
tian law. It is to be expected, therefore, that these unchris- 
tian states will exercise their power to make war on each 
other when and where they please. They will do this as it 
suits their selfish ends, their imperialistic ideas, or their 
purely humanitarian conceptions of justice and “honor.” 

It is my earnest hope that by publishing this book I shall 
drop a literary shell, rough and ugly though it may: be, 
into the midst of the CHRISTIAN camp which will set 
some, at least, of Christ’s professed people talking, question- 
ing, protesting, many of them probably shrieking vengeance. 
If I can achieve this I shall have done something worth while. 
Anything is better than the deadly stupor or the utterly false 
arguments on this vital question, everywhere manifest under 
the paralyzing sway of worldly governments and an apostate 
Church. 

I want also to respond to the cry of the sheep, the youth- 
ful, most hopeful sheep of the FLOCK OF CHRIST, who, 
almost shepherdless in the wilderness of ignorance as re- 
gards this question, shrink at the dictate of a sensitive Chris- 
tian conscience from the assassin’s profession. These are look- 
ing for help that will enable them to give a reason for the 
faith that is in them. 


“He That Hath an Ear” 
There are certain people who will not understand this 
book. ‘They will very likely attack it. Among these will 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD II 


be those who have lost faith in the inspiration of the Bible; 
who deny the deity of Christ; who mix up the Old and the 
New ‘Testaments without regard to the dispensations to 
which they primarily relate; who repudiate the truth about 
man’s fall, his lost condition and God’s scheme of atonement, 
which in type, prediction or achievement is the predominant 
theme of God’s Word; who do not believe that God has a 
plan as well as a Gospel for this world; who do not think 
that Christ will reign victorious over Satan in a sinless and 
deathless age; who value the prophecies mainly as useful 
epistles out of which to extract texts for sermons; who think 
that the race, while rejecting Christ, is all the time growing 
nearer perfection; who accept the theory that man, by de- 
veloping his better qualities, will, through the process of 
“evolution,’ work out his own redemption; who have no 
use for the doctrine of the second coming of the Lord; who, 
while centering all their thoughts on a far distant and 
visionary heaven, regard the Bible-predicted millennial 
kingdom as a more or less mythical Utopia; who treat Christ’s 
doctrines, the Scriptures, the Prophets, the Saints, the life, 
death and resurrection of the Lord, as an excellent system 
of religion upon which to build Churches, Sunday Schools, 
Societies, Organizations, Institutions, the interests of which 
must be considered of more importance than the reign of 
the Saviour and the establishment of the Kingdom of Heaven 
—none of these will understand this book. On the other 
hand, those who believe the very opposite of all these things 
will doubtless, on that account, possess the “ear to hear... 
what the Spirit,” during these tremendous days, “says to 
the Churches,” and will be able to judge wisely and arrive 
at correct conclusions concerning the things I have written. 


Theology and Do-ology 
As a CHRISTIAN there is, of course, for me a theology, 
just as for the student of the heavens there is an astronomy. 
In that theology there are articles fixed as the stars, lasting as 


12 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


eternity. One of these is the Sixth Commandment. It has 
never been annulled; on the contrary, I find it reiterated 
and reinforced on the lips of Christ. It is also confirmed 
by the teaching on almost every page of the Epistles— 
“Thou shalt do no murder.” 

Another chapter in my theology is the Sermon on the 
Mount. The more I read it, the more it seems to say what 
it means, to mean what it says. The ingenious mental acro- 
batics of the commentators have not yet succeeded, despite 
their frantic efforts, in making the Saviour teach the very 
opposite of all He declared. Masterly as have been their 
attempts at interpretation, modification, adaptation, they have 
not yet achieved the feat of making any one really believe 
that when the Lord said, “Love your enemies,’ He meant 
to imply that the proper thing to do with a foe was to stick 
him through the ribs. No! The Sixth Commandment 
still stands. It is read every Sabbath in the Morning 
Prayers of the Church of England, the Church where the 
bishops, having repeated it and having listened to the sol- 
diers’ response,—“Lord have mercy upon us and incline our 
hearts to keep this law’’—proceed at once to give them their 
“blessing” in going forth to break it. 

Having regard, then, to the light thrown on the Bible by 
the Spirit enlightened scholarship of this age, and to the 
fact that the Sixth Commandment and the Sermon on the 
Mount are still on the statute-book of the Christian Church, 
for me there seems no escape from the conclusion that 
the professed follower of Jesus must say frankly if he will 
obey them, and be a Christian, or ignore them, and be either 
an Old Testament Jew or a heathen. 


Topsy-Turvydum 
Of course I know all about the professional sophism, 
which has sprung from sources perilously near to earthly 
thrones—theories which have created a sort of habit of mind, 
by which it has become excusable for Christians to give the 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 13 


lie to their strongest convictions and, as regards this matter 
of fighting, call black white, and white black. I know how 
such sophistry, reinforced by earthly powers, by the instinct 
of fear, and the incentive of self-interest, will lay the Chris- 
tian conscience prostrate before the dictates of worldly 
potentates. 

It is astounding to see how such professed Christians, just 
because a little clique of statesmen cry “war,” will at once 
proceed to turn upside-down the most vital tenets of their 
faith and morality. Because a few “diplomats,” who are 
supposed to have no authority of any kind in the Church of 
Christ, and hardly any of whom know anything of real con- 
version—because these announce that certain national inter- 
ests must be sought, certain policies pursued or wrongs 
righted by an antichristian method, which involves the 
killing of tens of thousands of men, then bishops and divines, 
deacons and elders, will start in to call ghastly, dastardly 
crimes by plausible and even picturesque names. Premedi- 
tated, wilful, and wholesale murder becomes “the conquest 
of the enemy;” highway and daylight robbery is “capture 
of treasure;”’ devilish pride and skilfully fostered hatred 
masquerades as “a commendable patriotism; venomous, 
envious, red-hot rage is only “‘magnificent courage and fight- 
ing force; consummate lying, that would outclass the low- 
est-down perjured scoundrel, is described as “brilliantly 
clever intelligent work;’’ ditches filled with gory and rotting 
corpses are the ‘‘quiet resting places of the heroic dead;”’ 
and hospitals full of eyeless, armless, legless, footless, ruined 
men are “‘the bases of the splendid work of Red Cross So- 
cieties.”” 

All this wild topsy-turvydom of everything that makes 
Christianity Christian and morality moral, has been going 
on in the CHRISTIAN CHURCH with a monstrous 
hypocrisy and a sickening sentimentality before a wonder- 
ing world for a hundred years or more, and all because the 
statesmen of Europe, some of whom profess to be prominent 


14 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Christians, have decreed that the only way to safety, right- 
eousness, peace and prosperity is zot the way of Jesus Christ, 
but the way through the hell of hate and destruction. As for 
me, I cannot, for the life of me, bring such a sudden revolu- 
tion of ideas to square either with conscience or Christianity. 
Nor can I join with the “Church dignitaries” of Berlin, 
London and Washington and defend this moralizing of rank 
immorality on the ground that a greater peril, be it of na- 
tional extinction, commercial greed or merciless autocracy, 
justifies the saints of this era in resorting to such measures. 
Commercial enterprises, political schemes, even the oppres- 
sion of tyrannical emperors are, for the Christian no justi- 
fication of war. ‘The early Church, which was born and 
cradled in the midst of cruelties and iniquities more shame- 
ful and vile than any yet charged against the Prussians, re- 
fused to retaliate or to bear arms. ‘This is indisputable. 


The Bayonet versus the Ballot 


Moreover, if it is right for the Christian to make war 
with carnal weapons (which of course it never can be), there 
are causes which would have a far stronger claim upon the 
use of a sword in his hands than the aggression of a “for- 
eign” power. For him the pre-eminently important spheres 
are the religious and moral spheres. In the religious sphere, 
and from the Protestant point of view, for instance, it would 
be far more justifiable to kill Roman Catholics than it is 
to kill Englishmen or Germans, and from the Roman Cath- 
olic viewpoint the same would be true as regards Protestants. 
With God, heresy is worse than imperialism. The Church 
made a fatal pilgrimage up that street, and found “no thor- 
oughfare” there. It led to the bloody “Roundheads” of 
Cromwell, and the gruesome terminus of the Spanish In- 
quisition. 

In the moral sphere it is the same. If it is legitimate for 
Christians to arm themselves and shed blood in a good cause, 
why crawl along with the slow process of constitutional 


LHE SAINT AND THE SWORD 15 


agitation? ‘The sword is at least a quicker method than 
oratory and votes. Why not march through the land shoot- 
ing down saloon-keepers, white-slave traffickers, boodlers, 
as “Christian” soldiers now shoot down citizens of a “for- 
eign” land. If the “Christian” citizens of Germany, 
England and the American Republic feel justified in kill- 
ing each other as the children of the Devil, it is well for 
them to remember that there are other armies of booze- 
distilling, graft-seeking, money-hunting, woman-degrading, 
property-swindling, negro-lynching immoral monsters whom 
they should also get after with their bayonets and their guns. 
These also are the offspring of his Satanic Majesty. 

With the Christian, things are not as they are with world- 
lings. If it is right for him to employ carnal weapons at 
all, he is most justified in employing them against the things 
that most matter. He cannot be consistently condemned as 
a murderer because he uses a six shooter in putting a brewer 
out of business, and then be commended for using a bayonet 
to stick another fellow through the bowels because he is an 
autocrat. In his estimation the booze scourge is every bit as 
bad as the scourge of Prussianism. John Barleycorn has 
done and is doing every bit as much to strangle the human 
race as could ever be achieved by the tyranny of the worst 
despot who ever wore a crown. 


The Acid Test 

Again, war today is no longer a side issue. The whole 
world is cursed with the fighting spirit. Nations, until lately 
the opponents of great armies if not of great navies, have 
succumbed to militarism. Under the pretex of abolishing 
war they have become intensely war-like, doubling their 
navies, adopting hitherto undreamed of methods for raising 
vast armies and adopting instruments appallingly greater in 
destructive power. Universal military training is openly ad- 
vocated. Even socialists are appealing to the sword. “Thou- 
sands of Christians are being challenged by the pistol and the 


16 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


rapier of the anarchist to put to the test the teachings of 
Christ. Money flows like water in the course of blood- 
shed. The tide of militarism is therefore exactly at 
that high-water mark which the Lord Jesus said it would 
reach in these last days—affecting every nation, afflicting 
every home, right against the heart of every Christian. We 
Christians cannot ignore it. We cannot evade it. What 
are we going to do about it? 

Moreover, militarism has not only become the supreme 
question, but the test question of the hour. What the “acid 
test” is to cloth, and to gold, such a test has the war ques- 
tion become to Christianity. Just as a grain or two of anti- 
pyrene placed in a solution of iron chloride will instantly 
change the color of the whole from a white yellow to a deep 
crimson, so the “war question” introduced into a religious 
gathering will immediately indicate whether the Christianity 
there professed and experienced is the Christianity of Christ 
or a Christianity permeated with the spirit of this world. Im- 
port the topic of ‘armies and navies” into a religious “con- 
vention,” a Christian institution of learning, a Christian 
home, a Christian pulpit, and it will iramediately indicate 
whether the religion there professed is a plausible philosophy, 
based upon only a partial acceptance of the teachings of Jesus, 
commendable to the minds of unregenerate men, comform- 
able to this age—a religion adaptable to the reasonings of 
the carnal mind and supported by material weapons—or 
whether it is the religion of the crucified Saviour, which the 
world hates as much today as it did when He introduced it 
and sealed it with His blood. Go into a “General Assem- 
bly,” “Conference,” “Union,” “Convention,” of any of the 
great denominations, stand up to address even a “Scripture 
School” or “Bible Institute,” or ‘“Officer’s Council” and 
thunder against once popular, but now unpopular sins, like 
booze, immoral theaters, dancing, white-slavery, and you will 
get your eloquence endorsed by thunders of applause. Wicked 
as they are, the nerve-center of the sin of the world is not 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 17 


there just now. But you say just one word against war; 
war, not of course in the abstract, not unjust war or war 
afar off in South Africa or Prussia as other nations practice 
it, but war itself as an anti-christian method; war when 
it is decreed by our leaders in our own land, as it affects our 
country, our business, our boys, our interests, our homes, 
just try and say one word against that kind of war and 
you will find you have dropped the “‘acid test” into the very 
doubtful solution of this world’s Christianity. It will im- 
mediately turn to its true color. How many of us discovered 
that it was one thing to denounce war prior to May, 1917— 
before the New Decalogue was issued from Washington— 
but quite a different thing afterwards! 


As soon as you try to show that the Christian must stand 
by the words of Jesus Christ before the words of any tem- 
peral potentate; that his heavenly citizenship must take prec- 
edence over his earthly citizenship; that he must trust God 
for his protection, even though it involves suffering for His 
sake, instantly you do this, the sympathetic atmosphere of 
that gathering will turn to frigid coldness, and though one 
who has learned to read the language of men’s hearts as it 
is written in their eyes may discern many troubled con- 
sciences, only a few will dare to express with their lips 
what they inwardly approve. You have touched the “Jive 
wire’ along which the Devil is most effectively operating 
in this hour of the world’s history. 


The Challenge of the Hour 


But since this is the test, here also is the great call to true 
holy courage. Once again the Church is confronted, as we 
should expect her to be in the closing hours of this age, with 
a condition of things which, though perhaps different in its 
presentation is yet similar in essence to that which sur- 
rounded the Church of the first centuries. “The opposing 
forces which closed in upon her then as now afforded, and 
are affording, a supreme opportunity for confessing her Lord, 


18 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


or denying both His teaching and His plan of operation for 
His people in this dispensation. The situation has every ap- 
pearance of the repetition of history. In the earliest age the 
Church stood by her Master, kept herself absolutely dis- 
entangled from the world’s political quarrels, and triumphed, 
though “with persecutions,’ both materially and spiritually, 
beyond the wildest dreams of man. Later on she sold her- 
self to kings of the earth, drew the sword with the armies 
of the world, and began at once the sure decline into the ~ 
fatal apostasy in which we see her today. 

In this “latter time” the same opportunity brings a new 
challenge to the “remnant”’—the true Body of Christ—found 
within as well as without the organized Church, which, as 
a whole, constitutes this great apostasy. This challenge con- 
fronts us with two questions of supreme importance. First, 
what is to be done to save this inner Church from repeating 
the error of the early Christians, and thus bringing about the 
tragedy of her own suicide? Second, and even more im- 
portant, what is to be done to save the Gospel from being 
lowered in the public estimation to the level of the mock 
evangel which has been preached before a puzzled humanity 
in war-ridden Churches and in the armed camps of Europe 
and America? “If the foundations be destroyed, what can the 
righteous do?’”’* It is with the hope of “doing my bit” for 
God and my country and with the desire to guide and sup- 
port some within the ranks of this true Church, during a 
time of misconception and danger, that this book is written. 

Militarism then, in which is centered all those world- 
powers which crucify Christ, is the Devil’s supreme chal- 
lenge to the Church today; the call for the witness against it 
is her great opportunity. Many of the godliest Bible- 
scholars of recent times have declared this dispensation almost 
closed. Certainly the signs are everywhere. If so, then 
this is the Church’s Jast call before her Lord returns. How 

2 Pas. 1533. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 19 


will she respond to it? Alas! with what deep sorrow we 
have to add, how fatal, till now, has been her reply. 

Still there are a faithful few. Multitudes more are being 
taught, by sorrow and tears, their error. Will they rally 
to their Master? It is a vital matter. The opportunities 
of winning, by suffering and self-sacrifice, the honored places 
in the coming kingdom are rapidly passing. The Lord is at 
hand! 

Impartiality and the Universal Autocrat 

The following pages have grown out of addresses which, 
since the beginning of the late European war, I have given 
from time to time, in connection with my evangelistic cam- 
paigns. While they constitute the outline and provide the 
main points, they have, especially toward the latter part of the 
book, been much enlarged. In order to make my meaning as 
clear as I could, I have thought it best to keep to the form of 
public speech. The urgency of the occasion has rendered 
literary merit difficult. Such addresses must of necessity 
contain a certain amount of repetition. ‘This, however, will 
help rather than hinder the argument. 

I have written purely from the CHRISTIAN STAND- 
POINT. I have tried to write impartially, for I feel abso-. 
lutely impartial. My experience in different nations has 
helped me here. I love them all. For years I worked with 
my father in an organization which perhaps more than any 
other then existing proved how great was the unifying power 
of the Cross. We had a flag which, with only one exception 
(consequent upon an unhappy division in the United States), 
has been carried, unaccompanied by any other flag, through 
the streets of almost all the nations on earth. It stood for 
the King of Kings, for an eternal country, for a full Gospel 
of love and mercy. Its followers, many of whom were raised 
from the lowest depths, have risen to the truest kind of citi- 
zenship. 

I know something of the faults and the graces of most of 
the peoples comprising the nations of Europe. I have found 


20 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


human nature, as regards its fundamental characteristics, 
about the same everywhere. From the national, family and 
individual standpoints, SELF is the imperial and merciless 
autocrat wherever the sun shines. No one deplores the 
withering blight of Prussian, French, Italian, Austrian mili- 
tarism more than I do; nobody more than I the unchristian 
policy of British navalism. I see the same evil root beneath 
them all. They all exist either for aggression or preserva- 
tion—that the governments which control them may either. 
get more or (and this is important to remember as regards 
those who have most) may keep what they've got. They all 
justify their operations in the name of Christ, though they all 
employ methods which are diametrically opposed to all He 
taught. | 


Shepherds Who Kill the Sheep 


In this book I have spoken, not to un-regenerate soldiers, 
multitudes of whom have been trained to believe that war — 
is a heroic duty, I speak almost entirely to the Church— 
especially to the Jeaders of the Church. It is upon us, who 
have taken the responsibility of teaching and leading the flock 
of Christ, there rests the great obligation to seek out the 
truth and stand by it at all costs. The spectacle recently 
presented to a godless world, by the shepherds of Christ’s 
flocks throughout the earth, standing, as it were, with 
butcher’s knife in hand, dripping with the blood of the sheep 
of each others’ folds, is a gruesome anomaly which should 
surely stir some one to lead the way back to a love and service | 
of the Great Shepherd by which, to say the least, archbishops, 
bishops and nonconformist divines might be spared the 
horror of urging their followers to blow off each others’ 
heads and tear out each others’ eyes. 

If it were not so ghastly a tragedy, the screaming comedy 
on the world’s stage today would be this bloody Christianity, 
performing a farcical homage to a patient, unresisting, cruci- 


fied Christ. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 21 


No Axes to Grind 


In the preparation of these addresses I have been greatly 
assisted by a peculiar experience which has brought me into 
a place of absolute independence. I am attached to none of 
the denominations. I love and work with them all. No 
one is responsible for anything I have said but myself. I 
have therefore no particular axe to grind; no Church or in- 
stitutional “interests” to uphold; no occasion for interpreting 
the world’s events in such a way as to secure “open doors,” 
“new opportunities,’ etc., for any particular organization. 
I am in no sense subject to the insidious temptation to “speak 
softly” about hellish disaster, because it opens the way for 
“making another mark” in the world for any one or for 
increasing the popularity of some much “boosted” Christian 
Society. “The Christian should have one interest at heart. 
It should be the interest of the Lord Jesus Christ. He 
should be sure that one supreme personality stands before 
his vision, Whose approval transcends all other praises, as 
the noonday sun outshines the stars—that one is his Lord, his 
Master, his coming King. What He said, what He thinks, 
how He rewards should count supremely with him. 


Discretion and Valor 


Before deciding to publish this book, and when the late war 
was declared in Washington, I suspended by public work, and 
retired into the mountains of northwestern Carolina, to get 
alone with God. . Three-fourths of these pages have been 
written there. I felt another crisis had been reached in 
my life. Was it possible that I might, after all, be mis- 
taken? Ought I to follow the example of some esteemed 
champions in the cause of peace and suspend the expressions 
of my antagonism to war till the war-clouds passed over? 
Would it not be better to lay aside my lecture on “The 
Prince of Peace,” extract from my sermons those parts which 
laid such emphasis on love and forgiveness as fundamental 
to the religion of Jesus, and join with a godless majority 


22 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


and a war-whooping press in swelling the chorus for “patri- 
otism’’? 

Such a course offered large opportunities for me. Would 
not such chances for doing good out balance the necessary 
compromise? Did not loyalty as a Britisher to country 
and king, as well as sincere affection for America, the land, 
for me, of so much liberty, so many kindnesses, such im- 
measurable spiritual blessing, require at this time a passive 
acquiescence? Could I not offer myself as an evangelist for - 
the military camps, fall back on Old Testament standards, 
and exalt the God of war? Could I not substitute Joshua 
for Jesus for a little while, and preach stirring “patriotic” 
sermons from such texts as—‘“The sword of the Lord and 
of Gideon”? Was it not possible that there might be a ~ 
loophole in New Testament theology through which I might 
crawl and stand with the Bible in hand to justify the Chris- 
tian in drawing the sword? 

Divesting myself of all prejudice, I decided to devote 
whatever time might be necessary to a fresh investigation of 
the whole subject. I determined that, without flinching, 
I would settle, for myself, the question one way or the 
other forever. 

God’s Blue Book 

With several translations of the Bible, a good harmony 
of the Gospels, a concordance and a few good works of 
reference, I set myself to the task. I went right through the 
New Testament, marking carefully every passage that re- 
ferred in any way or had any possible bearing on war—those 
for it with red, those against it with blue. When I got 
through I found that the New Ttestament was a “blue 
book” straight from the government of God. I want to bear 
testimony that after three months’ careful, prayerful study of 
its pages, working at it on an average of ten hours a day, 
I could not find a single passage that would justify the use 
of the sword, for the purposes of war, in the hand of the 
Christian. I could not find an argument of any kind that 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 23 


would enable me to get in with the war crowd without sell- 
ing my conscience and betraying my Lord. 

Of course I found and carefully marked the few passages 
which seemed at first sight to offer me a place as a Christian 
in the butchery of Europe. They were the few familiar 
texts around which the great leaders of Christendom gather, 
like buzzing bees around a honey-can, whenever the bugles 
summon to war. But on close examination these apparent 
breaches in the defenses of the anti-war argument turned 
out, in the light of the clear interpretation the Lord gave 
me, to be almost the strongest of all the positions in the non- 
resistance policy. 

Nothing could be further from the truth than to suppose 
that because I attack what I call “Bloody Christianity” 
I am in any sense an advocate of “bloodless” Christianity. 
All my hopes for myself, for mankind, for this world and 
the next, are based on the precious blood of the Saviour once 
shed for the remission of sins. ‘The fact that the higher 
critics of the German, English, American and_ other 
schools have sneered so contemptuously at the doctrine of 
the atonement—which many of them have called “the creed 
of the butcher's shops’—was not the least of the causes 
of the most colossal butchery the world has yet seen. 


Theological Microscopics 

Next to the teaching of the Holy Spirit through God’s 
Word I am indebted to nothing, both for suggestions and 
confirmations of my convictions, quite so much as I am to the 
arguments propounded by the Christian defenders of war. 
More particularly is this the case as regards those teachers 
of “advanced” Bible-study who, when they write on the 
Wwar-question, seem to me to dishonor their splendid record 
and refute much they have taught concerning dispen- 
sational and premillennial truth. All such defendants when 
under the cross-fire of the war zone’s. remorseless events 
bring to the Bible a microscopic inspection which destroys 


24 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


and distorts their outlook over the great mountain ranges 
of verity. They turn their minds from the safe and sane 
instruction which comes by a survey of the whole body of 
truth and fix their mental gaze on incidental atoms. ‘They 
are like misguided zoologists who seek to interpret the nature 
of the whole animal by the character of the cells which com- 
pose some excrescency on the tip of its tail. 

With such advocates the overwhelming mass of Christ’s 
teachings concerning non-resistence are lost because of a 
concentrated gaze on His little sheep-whip in the Temple. 
There is no room in their military articles for even a mem- 
tion of the great outstanding spectacles of His self-abnega- 
tion—His matchless endurance at Calvary—because all the 
space is occupied by long drawn-out arguments, which at- 
tempt to convert the manifestation of His divine majesty 
before which the soldiers fell back in Gethsemane, into the 
kind of “force” which, in the trenches of Europe, smashes 
men’s faces into bloody pulp. The solitary sentence on the 
lips of Christ about “selling a cloak and buying a sword” 
is made of far more importance than the hundred-and-one 
expressions which forever take the sword from the armory 
of the saint and place it in the hands of those who perish 
with its use. The fact that the Centurion, though a soldier, 
got his son healed and that Cornelius was an officer (they 
forget it was before they became Christians) are of 
infinitely more importance just now to these hardly pressed 
defenders of fury, than the numberless exhortations to pa-' 
tient endurance of wrong, to forgiveness of injury, to the 
practice of never-failing love, which fill to the brim the 
pages of the New ‘Testament. 


War Texts versus the Bible 


It would seem that it matters little to those preachers and 
theological professors that the New Testament, as indeed 
the history of the early Christian Church, is one long record 
of saints who, just because they refused to obey the God- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD. 25 


dishonoring dictates of earthly potentates, were like their 
Old Testament forerunners, “tortured, not accepting de- 
liverance—had trial of cruel mockings—scourgings—of 
bonds and imprisonments—were stoned—torn asunder— 
tempted—slain with the sword;” all this would appear to 
matter little! In war time, what, in their estimation, matters 
supremely is that a possible escape from a very awkward 
and threatening situation presents itself, since St. Paul speak- 
ing of the magistrate used that, for them, most fortunate 
sentence in his Roman Epistle—“He beareth not the sword 
in vain.” 

“The proper thing to do,” say all these Christian advo- 
cates of salvation from Prussia by Prussianism—‘“is to be 
less particular about anti-war contexts and to seize and 
magnify the few isolated war-texts, such, for instance, as 
those which insist on the honor and obedience due to all 
authorities. Upon these they fasten with the tenacity of 
horse-leeches—more especially upon those which refer to 
Paul’s magisterial “minister of God” armed with his reeking 
sword. It never seems to occur to them that in doing so 
they prove a little too much, for it was precisely this sword, 
in the hands of a magisterial scoundrel, which chopped off 
the apostle’s head outside Rome. ‘To all these Christian 
defenders of the doctrine of pugilism, fire and bloodshed I 
am, then, deeply indebted. ‘The weakness and ingenious 
sophistry of their contentions has confirmed my belief that 
truth is to be found in the opposite direction. 


b] 


Quitters and Converts 


This book is not written to aid “quitters.” It is not 
intended to help any one in shirking duty. It is a call to 
service for Christ and mankind quite as strenuous and far 
more important than any military service could ever be. I 
am not oblivious to the fact that the same arrant cowardice 
which has kept thousands of professing Christians from ever 
attempting to carry a single cross for Christ or the Church, 


~ 


26 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


will, whenever war is declared and their lives and goods are 
in danger, prompt them to take shelter behind a “‘conscience’’ 
which has suddenly and amazingly asserted itself; a “con 
science” which, for the first time in long years, has developed 
a “sensitiveness” about anything of any kind. Since all 
such have loved the world and still intend to live for it (none 
more so than many of the members of those Societies which 
have been exempted from Army Service)—rejoicing in its 
pleasures, grasping at its gains, sharing its emoluments— 
they ought to fight for it. 

On the other hand, I do not mean to imply that those 
whose eyes have been opened by the recent ghastly war to the 
true nature of things—to the truth as it is in Jesus; who, 
in the lurid light of the battle-fields have discerned the saving 
Gospel of Christ; who understand the bearing of that 
Gospel, not only om war, but on all the things of this 
life; who shall determine to separate themselves wholly to 
the service of Christ—I do not mean to imply that such as 
these should not boldly attest that fact before the world, 
take up their crosses, follow the Lord Jesus, and refuse in 
all future wars to slay their brother man. For all such 
this book is also written. The Dispensation of Grace did 
not close, as it would appear to have done with some of the 
“exempted” Churches of the U. S. A. in May, 1917! 


The Call for a Midnight Cry 


If in these pages I have spoken strongly, critically, with 
a seeming dogmatism, I have done this reluctantly but with 
a purpose. It is because I have felt myself overwhelmed 
with the terrible seriousness of the situation, the urgent need 
there is for warning of a startling nature. It is not my 
fault that I have found myself confronted with the anomaly of 
almost the entire Christian Church throughout the civilized 
world arming itself for self-destruction. I cannot help it 
that the voices, so eloquently raised in times of peace, in 
behalf of “pacifism” and the methods of the Master, were 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 27 


when the peril was upon us and it cost something to stand by 
such principles, hushed into a deathly silence or raised in 
cowardly opposition. I have spoken strongly because I feel 
that a clarion call is needed to summon Christians, and espe- 
cially Christian Leaders, to at least a faithful study of this 
vital subject. To leave it alone; to raise no light of guidance 
in this black hour of hate for the thousands who, over- 
whelmed by doubt, are everywhere calling for it—this has 
seemed to me the cruelest, most cowardly traitorship of 
which the servant of Christ could possibly be guilty. 

And so I have said straight out all that my heart—con- 
stantly under the influence of prayer and the study of God’s 
Word—prompted me to say. Nor have I said it without 
counting the cost. I know full well what it may mean for 
me not only as concerns an angry world and an aggrieved 
Church, but as regards those I love most on earth. But I 
can do no other. 

If the contentions of this book are wrong I am open to 
conviction and ready for recantation. Let then my antago- 
nists come forward. Discussion can but help the truth, and 


it is the TRUTH that sets us free. 


INTRODUCTION 


The Scripture quotations in this book have been taken from 
the authorized, the Revised and the American Revised, versions 
of the Bible, as they appeared to the author to be most correct. 
If the wording is found to be inaccurate according to one version 
it will be found correct by referring to others. : 


tant question, I do so without due recognition of the 

fact that it is both a delicate and a difficult one. I wish 
to approach it with all the care, as regards both demeanor 
and argument, which it demands. I know something of the 
sorrow which has stricken the world; how large a proportion 
of mankind is at this moment mourning its dead; how mil- 
lions of hearts are bleeding as they think of the nameless 
graves of their loved ones in a foreign land; how homes 
which but a few years ago were bright with the sweetest 
fellowship are irretrievably bereft of husband, father, brother, 
supporter, friend. What I have to say I would say remem- 
bering that I speak as from the freshly erected monument of 
a whole generation now passed into the unseen. I am not 
deaf to the sighs nor blind to the tears of millions whose 
hopes are piteously shattered, whose dreams are sadly dis- 
illusioned. 

Nor do I forget that the colossal spectacle of human 
slaughter which has been, and in lesser degree, still is passing 
before our eyes in the world today is the consequence, not 
only of sin but of its twin sister ignorance. ‘The world is 
deluded as well as demoralized. The gross darkness which 
obscures the truth about war is appalling. Centuries of mis- 
taken teaching on this question has falsified the thinking of 
the races when that thinking relates to international strife. 
This has been true, not only of the world’s political teaching, 
but more especially of its religious teaching. I am convinced 

28 


ET no one suppose that in speaking on this all-impor- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 29 


that God, knowing the misdirection of the dark ages, has 
“winked” at “the times of this ignorance,”? but now, con- 
cerning this matter He is calling His Church everywhere to 
repent and learn wisdom: “But he that knew not, and did 
commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few 
stripes.” ‘Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and 
doeth it not, to him it is sin.” ‘Jesus said unto them, If 
ye were blind, ye should have no sin.’”? 

This is why I wish to say nothing more than I am forced, 
which might rob the bereaved of those bright gleams which 
penetrate the darkness of their sorrow at this time. They 
are thinking of their loved ones now in a soldier’s grave, as 
those who gave their lives for a good cause. They have 
crowned them with the laurel of heroism. Where the truth 
does not compel me to do so, I would not spoil the song of 
praise with which they cheer an otherwise unbearable desola- 
tion. 

An Intelligent Approach 


I desire also to approach the subject intelligently. I wish 
to take an all-around and impartial view of it. Indisputably, 
there is an advantageous side to war. It means discipline, 
self-denial, loyalty, courage. Though its appeal is over- 
whelmingly on the side of man’s brutal instincts, yet it does 
seem to call forth a good deal of what is good. ‘Thousands 
have, for the first time in their lives, been led to look at 
interests outside their own. There has been a subjection to 
training, an inculcation of obedience, a learning of respect 
for authority, which is becoming all too disastrously scarce 
in our modern life. We must carefully distinguish, however, 
between Christian courage and the dare-devilism which 
rushes wildly to assume risks of life and death, which plunges 
heedlessly into danger unprepared to meet God and goes 
at the impulse of pride to seek glory. ‘This is little better 
than the courage of suicide. 


1Acts 17:30. 
*Luke 12:48. James 4:17. John 9:41. 


30 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Never forget, also, that these good qualities, credited to 
war, can be far more advantageously and with much greater 
effectiveness acquired in the service of God and the war- 
fare of faith. The great antidote for the war that fills is 
the war that saves and makes alive. The armies of destruc- 
tion are most effectively offset by the armies of salvation. 

There is every reason why I should appreciate the better 
side of the military system. It is the system under which, 
for a good cause, I have spent the best years of my life. IT 
know its power. My father too was a general. Our family 
were used of the Lord in raising up an army which has done 
things. On two occasions I have myself organized a little 
army of four hundred men, properly drilled and divided into 
companies, each having their officers, all equipped with neces- 
sary outfit of canteen, haversack, blanket, water-bottle; ac- 
companied by large vans for commissariat purposes, with 
ambulance wagons and moving headquarters. We marched 
seventeen hundred miles over the roads of England, bivouack- 
ing by the waysides for our meals; sleeping in barns, sheds 
and halls; marching sometimes thirty miles in a day, moving 
through dense crowds—sometimes very hostile—which came 
out to greet us; and holding evangelistic services in the great- 
est auditoriums with glorious soul-saving results. 

I know that if you want to get anything accomplished, 
either good or bad, there is no system which can begin to 
compare with the plan upon which armies are created and 
led to battle. A little band of people, often the most in- 
significant, when trained to obey orders and move together 
under the leadership of one enterprising spirit, will accom- 
plish more than fourteen committees of highly intelligent 
heads, each of which reckons its own thinking is the best, and 
varying wills, every one of which wants its own way. My 
message is not therefore all on the negative side. ‘There is 
a positive aspect. I hate the soldiership which spells gun- 
powder and blood, but I am an enthusiast for the Soldiers 
of the Cross. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 31 


A Sympathetic Approach 


I approach the subject also sympathetically. ‘There are 
other reasons why I should speak impartially. I have per- 
sonal interests and affections which are all on the side of 
militarism. One of my sons is an officer in the British Army. 
He has already returned four times wounded from the 
front. My wife, recently deceased, who was a Hollander, 
descended from a military family of no mean reputation. 
Her father, now in the Glory Land, and to whom this book 
is dedicated, was a brilliant young officer in the Netherland’s 
Army. He gave up both his commission and his fortune at 
the dictate of his conscience. Her uncle, one of the most 
esteemed men in that country today, is a general in the same 
army. I have a brother-in-law who was a commanding 
ofcer of a German automobile artillery company, besides 
others, both on the French and the Italian sides, who were 
liable to be called up in the late conflict. Both my wife’s 
grandfathers were colonels, one in the Swiss Guards, in the 
service of the King of Holland, and the other in the Nether- 
lands. The former fought at the battle of Waterloo. He 
was buried in a uniform emblazoned with medals, and a tablet 
exists to his honor in his native town in the Netherlands. So, 
you see, there is everything in my case to predispose me 
favorably to war, and it means something within the ranks 
of my own family for me to fight it. 

Once more, I know all about the glamour which attaches 
to what we call our “heritage of military glory.” It is hard 
to pull against because, being drummed into us from our 
babyhood, it has become part and parcel of our very make-up. 
We are swollen with pride on account of the achievements of 
our forefathers on the battle-fields of history. We stand on 
our tip-toes and use great swell words about Trafalgar, 
Waterloo, Valley Forge, or Gettysburg. Our poets have 
glorified the “Ride of the Six Hundred” and “The Charge 
of the Scots Greys,” while our voices have grown husky 


ab THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


singing “Rule Britannia’—‘The Marseillaise’—“Yankee 
Doodle’—‘“The Watch on the Rhine’—‘‘Marching 
Through Georgia,” and all the rest of it. 


A Fearless Approach 


But, notwithstanding all this, and despite all the “patriotic 
fervor” it stirs, I want to deal with this profession of hu- 
man butchery with all the boldness for which the occasion 
calls and which my duty as a Christian minister demands. 
In my opinion, the hour has come as never before in the 
world’s history for the exercise of God-inspired courage in 
smiting this war-dragon, whose insatiable thirst for blood 
has impoverished the life of whole nations and filled the 
earth with mourning. If we Christians fail to make war 
against war with at least an equal valor as that manifested 
by those who risk their lives in defense of their country, we 
deserve to be called cowards, and we can hope for nothing 
but contempt for our message. 

I want then to say right here that, palliate it as we will, 
adorn it with the trappings of refinement as we may, excuse 
it on the grounds of sad necessity as we try, glorify it with 
the record of heroic achievements as we can, ameliorate its 
sufferings with “Red Cross” contrivances as we do, it still 
remains an ungainsayable fact, that war is a superlative hor- 
ror. As enacted before our eyes on the gory stage of Eu- 
rope today, it exhibits a ghastly and composite character. 
A character which displays itself in diabolical deceit, con- 
summmate cruelty, scientifically contrived agony and ruinous 
destruction. It breeds a flaming hate between millions who 
never wronged each other. It resurrects and lets loose the 
savage beast which lurks in the human breast till men and 
women, mad with revenge, cast aside every restraint of civili- 
zation for a wild welter in blood. It exchanges the scales 
of justice for the bludgeon of the bully, discards a dis- 
criminating reason for the dictate of an idiotic passion, and 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 33 


tears eternal right from her God-appointed dominion that 
unreasoning might may be enthroned. 

When we look through history since the days of Christ, 
from the viewpoint of God and His Son, we can discover no 
single blessing brought by war that might not also have been 
wrought by other means. Nothing therefore which can for 
a moment compensate mankind for the many millions of 
bright young men whose bodies, it is estimated in the wars 
of this dispensation, have been pitched into the burial ditches 
of the battle-field, whose spirits for the most part, have been 
sent unprepared to the bar of God. 


Satan Does Not Destroy Himself 


Right truly spoke one of America’s greatest generals, one 
of the ablest strategists of the world, when he said, ‘““War is 
hell,” and you cannot make hell anything else than hellish. 
Whatever color you paint the Devil, he will still be the 
devilish monster he is. You cannot destroy the works of 
the great destroyer by invoking the powers of Beelzebub. It 
is interesting to note the devices great statesmen are resort- 
ing to in order to justify war. They always begin by de- 
nouncing it as an abomination, a scourge, and then go on 
to talk about waging it “humanely;” as if you could palliate 
murder by polishing the manners of the assassin or justify the 
cutting of a fellow’s throat by scientifically adjusting a ban- 
dage to the wound you had inflicted. As we shall see, this 
is the Devil’s own trick. He always attaches some pleasing 
and popular contrivance to his heels by which he hopes to 
obliterate the real trend of his tracks over the trail of his- 
tory. It is for this reason the advocates of killing armies 
always place such emphasis on Red Cross and ambulance 
work. Many a professing Christian has found a refuge from 
a troubled conscience in the Field Hospitals. Many a 
traitor to the Cross of redeeming love has hidden his shame- 
ful acquiescence in the gospel of hate behind the Red Cross 
of Geneva. Don’t misunderstand me. None could be 


34. THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


more thankful than I for this one ray of mercy over the 
otherwise impenetrable gloom of the battle-field. It is the 
one place in war where a true follower of Christ can be if, 
and always if, he takes with him no weapon but the armor 
of God, if he preaches the Gospel of Christ and eschews any 
kind of a compromise with the brutal profession, the deeds 
of which he tries to undo. But joining an ambulance 
brigade, which is part and parcel of a killing army, the 
ostensible cause for whose existence it is to patch up the 
wounds of its men in order that they may go back to inflict 
wounds on others, and which denies liberty to preach God’s 
Gospel of love, this is no business of a Christian, any more 
than it would be right for him to go into partnership with a 
distiller in order to enable the whiskey trade to continue 
with the least possible discredit or loss to the liquor traffic. 
This is why of all the preachers of the Gospel I pity most, 
it is the bunch who march with the butchering armies of 
the world as “chaplains.” Poor fellows! ‘They must often 
be in a tight place when called on to bury the bodies of two 
soldiers both of whom have been sent to fight each other 
by the supposed Church of Christ. It must be difficult to 
stand on a gun-carriage which tomorrow will be spattered 
with men’s brains and preach from the New ‘Testament, 
honeycombed as it is with exhortations to love your enemies, 
when your congregation is armed with rifles, bayonets, 
grenades, bombs and automatic six-shooters! What a strange 
mixture there must be in the singing of those camps—“ Jesus 
lover of my soul” and “Good-by, Piccadilly”—“Jesus shall 
reign where’er the sun” and “Rule Britannia” or “‘Deutsch- 
land wtber alles’—“‘Onward, Christian Soldiers, with the 
Cross of Jesus going on before,’ finishing in a battle-shriek, 
“To hell with the enemy.” 

It is too absurd. 

You cannot join the Gospel with manslaughter! To 
Christian ministers so situated it seems to me that God must 
once more be saying: “Bring no more oblations, incense is an 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 35 


abomination unto me . . . the calling of assemblies, I can- 
not away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting . 

and when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes 
from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: 
your hands are full of blood.” 


War from the Christian Viewpoint 


But this brings me to perhaps the most important remark 
I have to make in these addresses. Unless you carefully 
remember what I am now going to say, you will not be able 
to understand my conviction or my argument. I am not 
attacking war from a political viewpoint. I am not attack- 
ing war from the standpoint which is generally taken by the 
pacifist movements of our time. I shail incidently refer to 
some of these arguments in support of a far stronger posi- 
tion. It would not be difficult for me to prove that, even 
from the viewpoint of expediency and common sense, war 
was a savage, barbarous, ruinous method of settling national 
disputes. But my attack is along quite another line. I con- 
demn war because it is ANTI-CHRISTIAN. I take my 
stand by Jesus Christ, Who was the profoundest thinker, 
the ablest teacher, the wisest administrator, of all 
who have yet appeared or ever will appear upon the 
stage of history. I believe He was not only the Saviour of 
the world, but that He was its greatest politician, aye He 
was its Creator, its true King, its Owner: “By Him were 
all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth, 
visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, 
or principalities, or powers; all things were created by 
Him.”? He knew what He was talking about. He had 
the advantage over all modern high-brows because He under- 
stood, not only the significance of the events passing before 
Him, but He saw into the future and knew the end from 
the beginning. ‘That is more than King George, the Kaiser, 
the British Premier or the German Chancellor can do. 


SANT Rta at hs) 1 6.0) Col. 26. 


36 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Understanding this, I believe He has a plan for this old 
world. His plan will be carried out. His words will come 
true. Heaven and earth will crumble into dust before one 
syllable of the statements He made shall pass away.1 That 
is why I want to stand four-square with Him. 

Remember always, then, that I am speaking of war from 
the Christian standpoint. If I were not a Christian I think 
I would be a militarist. It is, I admit, an insane system, 
but all sin leads to insanity. I would have sense enough to. 
see that history, if it shows anything at all, shows that un- 
regenerate man has never yet devised nor is ever likely to 
devise any method by which he may overcome racial pride 
and national greed. I would not be so blind as not to see 
that all wars have been brought about by one or both of these 
two causes. 

Rights of the Unregenerate 


So I am not dictating to ungodly nations concerning their 
right to make war on each other. I recognize the fact that 
there are, so to speak, rights of the unregenerate. Men who 
are not real Christians—who have not experienced the change 
of heart which distinguishes a carnal from a spiritual being 
—cannot be expected to shape their deeds by the Christian 
standard. God’s chief reason for condemning such men will 
not be because they made war on each other, but because 
they rejected His Son Jesus Christ as their Saviour, Lord 
and King. If they wish to remain rebels and live only for 
their own selfish ends, then I can understand why they — 
should deceive and fight. If they want to settle their griev- 
ances in this idiotic manner they must go their own way and 
do so. If this is the best scheme their boasted civilization 
can invent for settling their quarrels, I suppose they must 
continue to blow each other to bits. As for me, notwith- 
standing the tomahauk and the scalping, I prefer, if you are 
to have war, the old Red Indian savage type. I prefer the 
painted and feathered warriors of the Soudan or Zululand, 

1Matt. 24:35. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 37 


who, crafty though they were, came out into the open, faced 
each other with little but their skill of aim and steadiness of 
nerve to rely on and fought it out, leaving the strongest on 
the field to proclaim the victory. I say if you are to have 
war I would infinitely prefer that kind, because it is im- 
measurably less sneakish than the warfare of our eternally 
trumpeted “‘civilization,’ which relies less and less on the 
qualities of men and more and more on the pitiless exacti- 
tude of machinery. 


The Savage Warrior and the Scientific Sneak 


The romance of war, as it once existed—its freedom for 
swift movement of armies, for skilled maneuvering by able 
and daring generals, for brilliant attacks on flank or rear of 
the enemy—all this has now departed. In its place we have 
hundreds of miles of human warrens with millions of men 
either swimming in liquid mud or skulking behind sand-bags, 
tree-stumps, rocks, squinting through peep-holes and squirt- 
ing bullets, six hundred to the minute, through the muz- 
zles of “machine-guns.” ‘This colossal butchery has given us 
all a taste of what “‘science’ can do when devoted to the 
“most noble art of war.” If this is how the idolized “law 
of evolution” works out, then it will not be the “fittest” who 
will “survive” in the battle of life, but the most ‘“‘unfit.” It 
will be the “survival” of something even worse than the 
creatures with the longest claws and the sharpest teeth. It 
will be the survival of the brains best adapted to the lowest 
kind of deceit, most skilled in the art of substituting a nerve- 
less mechanism for personal character and courage. 

No. If you want to see war at its best—war most calcu- 
lated to draw out the true metal in a man—you must no 
longer go to the modern soldier, who envelops himself with 
all kinds of devices for self-protection while seeking the de- 
struction of his foe, you must go to the defenseless savage, 
whose breast is bared, whose courage keyed for an unequal 
fight with his enemy. Many a British regiment has stood 


38 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


aghast at that wonderful fearlessness as wave after wave 
of magnificent humanity has leaped, with bare shining skins, 
to meet the bullets from a thousand rifles.. Well did Kipling 
voice the sentiment of many a Tommy Atkins when he put 
these words into his mouth: 


“So ’ere’s to you Fuzzy-wuzzy at your ’ome in the Soudan; 
You’re a pore benighted ’eathen, but you’re a first-class fightin’ 


Andee. to you Fuzzy-wuzzy with your ’ayrick ’ead of ’air, 
You big, black, boundin’ beggar—for you broke a British square! 
Now having cleared the ground for the argument, I want 
to ask you to consider this subject with me as it lends itself 
to the following divisions of thought. I have five indict- 
ments to lay against war: 


1. WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE, FOR 
THE CHURCH, IT IS FORBIDDEN. 


2. WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
ANTI-JUDICIAL. 


3. WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
IMMORAL. 


4. WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE FOR 
THE CHRISTIAN IT IS UNPATRIOTIC. 


5. WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
PROHIBITED BY THE TEACHINGS AND EX- 
AMPLE OF CHRIST. 


PART I 


WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE, FOR 
THE CHURCH IT IS FORBIDDEN 


pcos 


pe Sid 
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<oe ee 





I. CARNAL WAR IS FORBIDDEN TO THE 
CHURCH BECAUSE IT IS OUT OF ITS 
PROPER TIME 


War is anti-christian because, for the Church, it is for- 
bidden. Note always I say for the CHURCH. For the 
godless world it is another matter. No intelligent consider- 
ation of this subject is possible till there is a clear definition 
in our minds concerning certain institutions and dispensa- 
tions referred to in the Bible which are as distinct from each 
other as night is from day. Christians get into all kinds of 
muddles because they fail to distinguish between these things. 


The Laws of Reasoning 


Every system of thought, as every calling and profession 
in the natural world, is controlled by laws of reasoning. 
If you are a lawyer you must shape your arguments accord- 
ing to the codes of law under which you plead, you cannot 
apply nautical law to the affairs of a city salesman. If you 
are an engine-driver and you want to think about engines, 
you must shape your thoughts by the rules of engineering, 
you cannot run machinery by the methods of carpentry. If 
you are a gardener and you want to reach proper conclusions 
about cultivation, you must adjust your thinking to the laws 
of agriculture, you cannot cultivate apples as you weave a 
cotton fabric in a mill. If you are a doctor, you must apply 
to your patient the principles of surgery, you cannot pre- 
scribe your medicines by the rules of astronomy. You must 
keep things in their proper places and apply to each the 
principles of the system to which each belongs. Note care- 
fully, however, that while you do this there ARE important 
relationships which these callings and professions hold to 
each other. There ARE relationships between the salesman 
and the seaman, the engineer and the carpenter, the gardener 


4! 


~ 


42 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


and the linen merchant, the doctor and the mathematician. 
You get at these relationships exactly only when you treat 
each as belonging to its own sphere. 

Now the necessity for this discrimination is precisely the 
same when you come to deal with the truths and teachings 
of the Bible. ‘The most essential thing as regards the study 
of the ‘Word of Truth” is to know how to “rightly divide” 
it.1 Without such an apportioning of the things that go 
together and such a holding them in their proper places, 
you can prove anything from the Bible you set out to demon- 
strate. Oh! the appalling ignorance of the average Christian 
concerning the correct method of Bible study. “To combat 
this ignorance great efforts have been made and wonderful 
light has come to the world during the last fifty years. God 
has raised up men of keen insight into His Word—men of 
patient scholarship, mighty in prayer, whose work has been 
owned of the Lord in the establishment of Bible Institutes 
and Bible Conferences in many lands. The Bible has thus 
been reopened, and not a few thousand have been enabled to 
see its wealth of teaching, by being brought to the study of 
it from the viewpoint of the early Christian Church. But 
will these institutions, which have thus emphasized this 
teaching, be true to its inferences and consequences, now the 
real test is coming on the earth? We shall see! Alas! in 
some instances we have seen already! 


Dispensational Truth 


Take, then, this matter of fighting. People are A Rea 
quoting Old Testament Scripture to justify war. But this 
only displays their ignorance of that wonderful unfolding of 
truth which runs through the Bible. To understand the 
Bible one must, for instance, bear in mind the people to 
whom it was primarily written. Very much of the Old 
Testament, that is to say, when taken in its Jiteral interpre- 
tation, was written primarily to the Jew. It related to 


2 +Tim: 2:35. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 43 


God’s temporal kingdom—the only material kingdom He 
has ever had on this earth, the kingdom of Israel. But the 
Jewish Dispensation is now closed, their nationality is sus- 
pended and the history of that nation, and the exhortations 
of God addressed to the Jews in their national capacity— 
where of course they do not refer to unfulfilled prophecy— 
can only have a sfiritual interpretation to us who, as the 
Christian Church, are under the New Covenant of Love. 
Unless you get the fact of these dispensations clearly in your 
mind, you can never properly understand what the Bible 
teaches concerning war, or indeed much else. 

In the Scriptures the Jewish nation is one thing, the 
Church of Christ is entirely another. The history of Israel, 
when taken as the symbol of our spiritual warfare, is brim- 
ful of the most beautiful and inspiring truth, just as the 
sacrificial scheme of the tabernacle is full of exquisite types 
of the great sacrifice of Calvary to which it pointed, where 
the Lamb of God was offered for the sins of the world. But 
if you take that history and that sacrificial system, and apply 
them literally to the Church, you will be landed in the most 
distracting confusion and find yourself confronted by the 
most serious contradictions. 

The teaching which concerns the Church, in this Dis- 
pensation of Grace, affords the sharpest possible contrast to 
the injunctions addressed by Jehovah to the Jewish people 
when they comprised His chosen nation on earth. As a 
nation, which He Himself had ordained according to His 
covenant with Abraham, over which He Himself presided, 
the Jews constituted not only His medium of instruction for 
the nations around them, but acted as the executors of His 
direct judgments in the world. Nor must we ever forget 
that the Israelites, though chosen of God to be His people, 
were themselves at the beginning of their history in the 
densest darkness and the grossest ignorance. They, too, had 
to be taught and trained before they learned to know the 
will and the mind of the Lord. This could only be accom- 


~“ 


44 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


plished progressively. Hence their laws were adapted to 
their condition and to that period when there was little 
knowledge of God, and when cruelty, with sensuality, was 
supreme. Speaking of this period and of these laws, God 
says through Ezekiel:—-‘I gave them also statutes that were 
not good, and judgments whereby they should not live.”? 
The whole purpose of Israel’s national history, constitution 
and religion, was to lead the world up to Christ. CHRIST 
and His Apostles are the final authorities of the Christian 
Church. Only that which they brought over from the Old 
Dispensation relates to the New Dispensation; what He 
abandoned in the Old Order is to be completely abandoned 
by His Church. For Israel is now set aside and the Church 
has taken her place. ‘The Church is expressly told that she 
is, while living in the world, to be separate from it—that one 
day, in an unexpected moment, she will be suddenly trans- 
lated out of it. 
Israel and the Church 


Let us look at one or two of these striking Old and New 
Testament contrasts. Speaking of ISRAEL we read :— 


“For the Lord thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land 
of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of 
valleys and hills, a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig 
trees, and pomegranates; ...and honey. A land wherein thou 
shalt eat bread without scarceness.”? 


But of the CHURCH we read :— 


“Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world.” “And 
Jesus said unto them, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the 
air have nests; but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His 
head.’4 “An inheritance incorruptable, and undefiled .. . re- 
served in heaven for you.’® “And Jesus looked around about and 
said. ... How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the 
kingdom of God.”® ‘Harken, my beloved brethren, hath not God 
chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the king- 
dom which He hath promised to them that love Him?’? 


1Fzek. 20:25. *Deut. 8:7, 9. %John 18:36. ‘Matt. 8:20.51 Pet. 1:4. 
®Mk. 10:23. ‘James 2:5. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 45 
About ISRAEL we read :— 


“And the Lord shall cause thine enemies that rise up against 
thee to be smitten before thy face. They shall come out against 
thee one way and flee before thee seven ways.” 


But of the CHURCH we read :— 


“They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time 
cometh that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God 
service.”2 


Of ISRAEL it is said :— 


“When the Lord thy God shall bring thee into the land whither 
thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before 
thee ... thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou 
shalt make no covenant with them, nor show mercy unto them.”’3 


But we read this of the CHURCH :— 


“But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse 
you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which de- 
spitefully use you, and persecute you.”4 “Being reviled, we bless; 
being persecuted, we suffer it; being defamed, we entreat.”5 


The rule for ISRAEL was:— 


“Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn- 
ing for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.”é 


The rule for the CHURCH is:— 

“But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil; but whosoever shall 
smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.”7 

You see, that as regards these injunctions to Israel and the 
Church, things are the exact reverse of each other. The 
antithesis could not be more striking. Unless, therefore, 
there is some intelligent way of accounting for this the Bible 
must be contradicting itself. But we know that to be im- 
possible. “There must, therefore, be some proper method of 
interpretation. ‘That method is the method of dispensational 
truth. Immediately it is applied to these passages there is 
the most perfect harmony. Among evidences of other pre- 
cious, long forgotten doctrines which are brought to light, 
we have the strongest possible argument against war. We 


*Deut. 28:7. *John 16:2. *Deut. 7:1, 2. ‘Matt. 5:44. 51 Cor. 4:12, 13. 
SEx. 21:24, 25. ™Matt. 5:39. 


46 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


see at once how war, so far as it is sanctioned for God's 
people, is placed in the Bible exactly where it belongs and 
nowhere else. It was the prerogative of that people chosen 
to be God’s representative nation on earth. 

Adopting this method of study, let us look into the Old 
‘Testament and see what it teaches us about war. 


First Mention of the Sword 


First, we discover that God alone has the right to sanc- 
tion the use of the sword. ‘The first mention of its employ- 
ment we find away back in the beginning of the book of 
Genesis, where we get a striking intimation of what. God 
intended should be the purpose of its future using. Back 
there in the Garden of Eden it is described as God’s “flaming 
sword”! which doubtless, in the hands of the cherubim, was 
used to drive Adam and Eve from Paradise as the partial 
penalty for their sin. ‘They used it also to “keep the way 
of the tree of Life.” Here, I say, we have a striking indica- 
tion of the use which God intended should be made of the 
sword. ‘That flaming weapon was to guard all that the 
“tree of life’? stood for—eternal life, eternal bliss. “That 
sword, which “turned every way,” was sent to prevent Adam 
from making everlasting profit in the way of disobedience to 
God. Had he eaten of the “tree of life’ he would have 
evaded the penalty for sin—death. And Jehovah intended 
that the sword, be it of fire or of steel, should be used only 
in conformity with judicial sanctions,—which He would 
later inaugurate,—in order to punish men for their wicked- 
ness and to prevent them profiting by evil. 


The Sacredness of Human Life 


In the next place we discover that the teaching of the 
Old Testament everywhere emphasizes the sacredness of 
human life. In fact, the whole Bible lays great stress upon 
this. Here it is worthy of note that the right to take human 


Gen. 3:22-24. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 47 


life, for any cause whatsoever, does not appear to have been 
given to any one during the First and Second Dispensations 
—the Dispensation of Innocence and the Dispensation of 
Conscience. ‘There is not a sentence in the Bible that justi- 
fies even a judicial infliction of the death-penalty by man till 
after the Flood and the opening of the Third Dispensation. 
It was only then that God ordained human government and 
laid down the conditions under which human life might be 
even judicially destroyed by man.. 

Such glimpses as we have into the history of those earliest 
ages give us overwhelming evidences of the tremendous im- 
portance which God attached to the protection of human 
life, and how any attack upon it invoked His swift anger. 
This is shown in the story of Cain, who, though the first 
murderer, a murderer so foul that he slew his own brother, 
was not himself destroyed even by God, but, quite on the 
contrary, was shielded, for God set a seal upon him, not to 
destroy him, but to protect him from vengeance. We read: 
“Whosoever slayeth Cain vengeance shall be taken on him 
sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any 
finding him should kill him.’? It is then perfectly clear 
that God intended that Cain’s punishment, in that age, 
should be other than the death-penalty. Note also how the 
case of Lamech emphasizes the same truth. Lamech had 
slain a young man in self-defense and could therefore claim 
“seventy and seven fold” more protection against vengenace 
than Cain.? 


Death only for Death 
It is important also to observe that the two great out- 
standing sins of the Antediluvians were Just (culminating 
probably in some unlawful co-habitation with evil spirits) 
and violence—The earth was filled with violence.”® God 
having tested mankind under the rule of individual con- 
science—the knowledge of good and evil—and finding such 


1Gen. 4:15. Gen. 4:23, 24. %Gen. 6:11. 


48 ‘THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


restraint insufficient to prevent men from killing each other, 
punished their blood-guiltiness by the Deluge. The Flood, 
therefore, was largely an expression of God’s abhorrence of 
the “violence” which took away human life without His 
sanction. It was only after the failure of man under the gov- 
ernment of individual conscience, and following the 
Deluge, that God instituted organized human government, 
and those words were used which are so frequently quoted by 
the Christian defenders of bloodshed: ‘‘Whoso sheddeth 
man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed.”* ‘That is to say, 
men shall be held judicially accountable for the shedding of 
each other’s blood and the death penalty shall be exacted for 
the taking of human life. It implies that no life shall be 
destroyed unless there is a warrantable assurance that the 
life so taken has been guilty of taking another life.2 Put 
into practice, as regards the circumstances of the hour, it 
means, ‘““whoso sheddeth the blood of an innocent conscripted 
German peasant or a drafted English or American city clerk, 
without exhausting every effort to discover whether those 
same men have shed the blood of others, is guilty of mur- 
der and deserves the death-penalty himself, for he has shed 
man’s blood without warrant, and by man shall his blood be 
shed.” How much more does this apply to those who force 
others to shed innocent blood. In God’s sight, therefore, 
only one thing can ever justify killing, and that is the proof 
of murder. Not the protection of earthly crowns or the 
greed of earthly nations; not policies which involve the 
killing of ten thousand innocent men in order to defeat 
other guilty men who are never killed at all. 


Ruling and Over-ruling 
Just here is where the trouble comes. Satan has wrested 
the sword from its ordained magisterial and judicial func- 
tions and has made it the weapon of lust, greed, vengeance, 
pride, and ambition. Hence it has become the great instrument 


1Gen. 9:6. ?See Gen. g:s. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 49 


of war—war which, more than all else in the world, has re- 
sulted in the most frightful wrong, the extreme of cruelty. 
It was to suppress such cruelty, to avenge such injustice, 
that the Lord armed His chosen nation with the sword and 
led them out to battle. He sought by this means to inculcate 
in His own people, as in the heathen nations around them, 
the fear of the Lord, in order that later He might, through 
them, lead the world to His cross. But so far as I can dis- 
cover there is no evidence that God ever sanctioned the 
raising and the use of armies by godless or heathen nations. 
Had He done so He would have given them His authority 
to use force in rebellion against Him. One does not arm 
one’s enemies. Certainly there is evidence that when these 
wicked nations have raised their own armies, God has per- 
mitted and sometimes overruled their contests to bring about 
His own purposes or to punish each other. Occasionally He 
has permitted them to chastise His disobedient people. But 
raising, organizing and ruling armies, as God did with Israel, 
is one thing; permitting and overruling them, as He does 
with heathen and Christ- “rejecting powers in fis and other 
ages, is quite another. 


In Him We Live 

He, then Who creates and maintains human life has the 
sole right to destroy it or to dictate the terms under which 
it shall be taken; ‘““There is one law-giver who is able to save 
and to destroy.” Get this then firmly rooted and grounded 
in your mind, that there is a special sacredness attaching to 
human life. For one thing, man’s living spirit is the fact in 
the material universe, which more than any other witnesses 
to the supernatural power of God. For there is no explana- 
tion of the immortal spirit but in God. “In the image of 
God made He him.”? Hence He has jealously guarded hu- 
man life against violence and forbidden, at peril of terrible 
judgments, any to either take it or lay it down, but at His 


1James 4:12. 7Gen. 9:6. 


50 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


bidding and for His sake. ‘The Bible has many expressions 
of this truth. It tells us that God Himself “breathed life 
into man” and that the very bread he eats could not nourish 
him, but “by the word that proceedeth out of the mouth 
of the Lord.”* We read, ‘““There is no God with me, I kill 
and I make alive.’”? ‘The Lord killeth and maketh alive; 
he bringeth down to the grave and bringeth up.’* ‘The 
Bible teaches that there is a marvelous connection between 
the very breath that is in me and God Himself, for “The 
Spirit of God is in my nostrils.”* It tells us that the main- 
tenance of life in every soul is because of His presidency, 
for “none can keep alive his own soul.’® “He giveth to all 
life and breath and all things’—“For in Him we live and 
move and have our being,’’® and it reminds us that for this 
reason we ought to recognize the hand of God perpetually 
over our lives, and we “ought. to say if the Lord will, we 
shall live and do this or that.’ 

God’s estimate of the value of human life is powerfully 
exemplified in Deuteronomy twenty-first chapter, where we 
have a full description of the inquiry which He ordained 
should be held when a dead man was found “lying in the 
field,” and it was not known who slew him. We there read 
of the “unused heifer” that was to be slain, the elders, judges 
and priests who were to come forth and wash their hands 
over the sacrifice and repeat a certain prayer—‘‘So” said the 
Lord, “shalt thou put away innocent blood from among you.” 


Again, in 2 Samuel 23:16, 17, we find David, who had 
slain “tens of thousands” without compunction at the dictate 
of the Lord, paying a remarkable tribute to the worth of 
only three human lives when those lives were risked only 
for his own profit and without the sanction of Jehovah. 
When in response to the expression of his longing for water 
from the well at Bethlehem, three of his mighty men broke 
through the host of the Philistines and, at the risk of their 


Deut. 8:3. *Deut. 32:39. %1 Sam. 2:6. ‘Job 27:33. "Ps. 22:29. ‘*Acts 
17:25, 28. "Jas. 4:15. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 51 


lives, procured the refreshing draft, he refused to touch it: 
“Be it far from me, O Lord, that I should do this; is not 
this the blood of the men that went in jeopardy of their 
lives?” While it was right, then, for these men to imperil 
lives in the conflicts ordered by the God of Israel, it was 
wrong for them to do so for anything less. Therefore David 
poured out that water “unto the Lord.” Human life-blood 
having been offered to purchase it, he gave it back to the 
Lord to whom it belonged. 


Jehovah’s Tribute to Human Life 

Again, if you will turn to the book of Numbers, thirty- 
first chapter, and read from the nineteenth to thewerhety- 
fourth verses, you will see the value of human liféet forGth 
by the ordinance which the Jews, according to thi:cree ad of 
Jehovah, were required to observe when they retued frox! fin 
their battles. ‘They had to “abide without the op sevdieen 
days.” If they had “killed any person” or “tchedscu any 
slain” they had to “purify” themselves the thisythand the 
seventh days. They had to “purify” all their raiment, every- 
thing they had used which was made of “skins” or “goat’s 
hair” or “wool.” All their captured treasure that could 
“abide the fire’ they were to make “go through the fire” 
and all the rest was to “go through the water.” I wonder, 
by the way, if it has yet occurred to the leaders of our so- 
called Christian armies, who justify their fighting by Jewish 
precedent, that consistency would demand a compliance with 
such an ordinance today! 


Yet once more remember the remarkable tribute which 
God Himself paid to the value of the life of mankind when, 
after the flood, and as if fearing such a wholesale destruc- 
tion of life might cheapen this priceless gift in the eyes of 
men, He entered into covenant with Noah that He would 
never more, in that way, destroy humanity. He also sealed 
that covenant, as He has perpetuated it, by setting His bow 
in the clouds. Think of His fidelity to His promise, to this 


52 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


very hour, in the face of provocation immeasurably greater 
than the worst wrongs any nation could inflict upon another. 
If God, in Whose hands is the breath of man, shows such 
patience and mercy toward the race, how dare the Christian 
take it upon himself to avenge his own or another’s puny 
wrongs by destroying his brother, “for whom Christ died’’? 

What a startling contrast to all this is the shockingly 
light and flippant manner in which many newspapers and 
“war-books” speak today of human life. Nothing could be 
more horrible than the heartless calculations which, during 
recent years of misery, have been made by “war experts’ who, 
sitting \y \eir firesides, pitted against each other, in appalling 
m’ jllions t ‘““man-power” of great nations. The men who 
co" mpri¢dhe contending armies were spoken of as if they 
re 0 preseiteso much “horse-power” in accumulated boilers, 
or!’ so mujelectric energy generated by steam or water- 
driven‘ dymos. 

Advoc.™ a! of the continuance of war openly support their 
case on the grounds that the victory will go to the nations 
who have the largest number of lives to fling into the jaws 
of death, and that their side possesses the greatest amount 
of this human fodder for cannon. ‘Their vision of victory 
is the parade of a ragged remnant of once almost innumer- 
able forces, marching over the graves of millions of their 
comrades, for a final struggle with another remnant—the 
remnant of a foe which, having already buried more mil- 
lions still, has a less balance of living souls to bear up in 
the final contest. 

Sanguinary Jokes! 

This habit of jesting with the sacredness of life is shown 
in the all but most “popular” war-book of recent times, 
“Over the Top.’”? The whole work might be suitably de- 
scribed as a clever attempt to turn the most fearful tragedy 
of the world’s history into quite an amusing comedy! It is an 


“Over the Top and give them hell.” By Sergeant Empey. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 53 


attractive collection of sanguinary jokes! Here is a speci- 
men. 

Describing the life and death grapple of a Prussian and 
three English soldiers, Sergeant Empey says: 


“It was a funny sight to see them (the Tommies) duck the 
swinging butt and try to jab at the same time. The Tommy near- 
est me received the butt of the German’s rifle in a smashing blow 
below the right temple. It smashed his head like an egg-shell. 
He pitched forward on his side and a convulsive shudder ran 
through his body. Meanwhile the Tommy had gained the rear of 
the Prussian. Suddenly about four inches of bayonet protruded 
from the throat of the Prussian soldier, who staggered forward 
and fell. I will never forget the look of blank astonishment that 
came over his face.” 


Surely there is little that can be rightly described as 
“funny” in all this! It is a shameless cheapening of {sod’s 
crowning gift—a living spirit. Yet it is the kind of war 
literature which was commended to Christian readers}, from 
many pulpits by men who preach that in God’s sight thete is 
no profit in gaining the whole world at the expense of one 
soul; and this is the sort of ‘war lecture” the author of this 
book was invited to deliver in not a few of the Sanctuaries of 
Him who gave His inestimatably precious life as a testi- 
mony to the value of other lives. 


Death and the Devil 


There is another reason why human life is so sacred with 
God and why He has reserved solely to His own omniscience 
the right to decree its extinction. It is because the opposite 
to life is death, and death came by sin and the Devil. It is 
the Devil’s final, most tremendous weapon. It is the awful 
instrument by which the door of hope is closed against the 
sinner, by which the boundless pity of the Heavenly Father 
is put beyond his reach. It is the treacherous blow which, 
so far as this world is concerned, lays prostrate the child of 
God, suspends his valued service, and thwarts all the con- 
sequences of what he might yet have accomplished for His 
Lord. To send a spirit into eternity is therefore to assume 
all the fearful responsibilities of its doom. That belongs 


54 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


to God alone. He who allies himself with the grim monster 
death, and parades its terrors in the pursuit of earthly gain, 
national pride or, for that matter, for any reason whatso- 
ever which has not behind it the direct sanction of Jehovah, 
goes hand in hand with the Devil himself. That is why God 
restricted the right of war-making to His own nation—the 
Jewish nation. Never, I repeat, has He authorized the use 
of the sword in war by any other power unless that power 
was employed to carry out His judgments or in direct 
relationships with His own people. Even then He only 
allowed it—He did not instigate it. It was either to aid 
them or to punish them. And note further, this sanction of 
war was only given even to His own people while they 
weit tunder the Dispensation of Law—while they constituted 
His kingdom on this earth and were the executors of His 
direct! government among mankind. Even then they were 
only to draw the sword as He directed. Israel never went 
out to fight against His orders without coming to grief. The 
presence of their general-in-chief, who was none other than 
the Almighty God Himself, was indispensable to their 
triumph. 
Jehovah, Joshua, and Modern Generals 

In the fact of this wonderful leadership and the miracu- 
lous nature of the battles which resulted from it, we have 
another strong argument against war for the Christian in 
this dispensation. Jehovah Himself led those armies into 
battle. “The Lord, He it is that doth go before thee: He. 
will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee; 
fear not, neither be dismayed.” Again and again the com- 
mand came to those armies from the royal court of heaven— 
‘Arise, go!”’—“Be strong and of a good courage; be not 
afraid, for the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever 
thou goest.”4 On one occasion, you will remember, the 
heavenly Commander-in-Chief of the armies of Israel ap- 
peared in person at the field-headquarters of General Joshua 

Deut. 31:8. Josh. 1:9. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 55 


and announced Himself as “Captain, or Prince, of the host of 
the Lord,”* and General Joshua, realizing that the very 
ground beneath him was holy, took off his shoes and fell 
with his face to the earth. I have yet to hear of a modern 
general thus coming face to face with God and taking orders 
for the disposition of his forces from the Director of the 
Universe. I have yet to hear of the General Staff of a 
modern army opening its deliberations with a prayer-meet- 
ing. I have yet to hear of a war-order going back to the 
artillery that no more shells are to be fired, or being passed 
along the trenches that machine-guns are to be discarded 
and rifles held to “attention” while the armies of the Kaiser 
or the Allies “stand still and see the salvation of the Lord.”? 
‘The “Christian” nations of our day have about one thousand 
times more confidence in gunpowder than they have in God. 


Supernatural Tactics 

It is well for those who defend the Christian’s participa- 
tion in the present day wars on the ground of Jewish prece- 
dent, to remember that those armies of Israel got a lot of 
things done for them that our modern soldiers, notwithstand- 
ing all their scientific equipment, know nothirg about. Mod- 
ern armies have no way of getting the first-born recruits of an 
enemy-nation smitten dead over night, as was done for Israel 
in Egypt. Modern armies, notwithstanding their smoke- 
gases, star-shells and artillery barrages, cannot screen them- 
selves with clouds from heaven by day and a curtain of fire 
let down from the sky in the darkness, such as the Israelites 
were screened with during their escape from Pharaoh. Mod- 
ern armies cannot cross the sea dry-shod as the army of Moses 
passed through the Red Sea; they cannot get over even the 
Suez Canal without a bridge. Modern generals cannot halt 
the flow of rivers, as Joshua did at Jordan. A British army 
recently surrendered to the abominable Turks because it 
could not extricate itself from the mud of the Tigris. 


1Josh. 5:14. Exod. 14:13. 


a] 


56 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Modern armies cannot get rations from heaven such as were 
sent every day to the Lord’s hosts in the Wilderness. Puffing 
locomotives and panting automobiles, by the thousand, must 
be employed to keep up the supplies. Modern armies have 
been using a thousand monster guns and half a million 
bombed and bayoneted men to get into Verdun, but the ex- 
peditionary forces of Joshua got into Jericho with a seven 
days’ parade and a shout. We've been hearing of light- 
producing rockets which burst in the air and illuminate the 
landscape, but not even the invincible Hindenburg could 
hold back the sun as was done for the slaughter at Gibeon. 
Without doubt the explosion of shrapnel is a terrible and 
destructive wonder, but the Lord’s captains at Azekah got 
better results by those hailstones from the sky, and no bother 
of bringing up big guns or waste of ammunition. Modern 
sappers and miners have blown up whole ridges of entrench- 
ments, but they’ve done nothing nearly so remarkable as the 
feat of Moses, when with a wave of his staff he dammed up 
the sea, and with another engulfed Pharaoh and all his hosts 
by releasing the pent-up floods. Nor has there been any up- 
heaval beneath the battle-fields of today which can compare 
with the bit of engineering which the Lord did for Israel, 
when at Aphak He tumbled that wall upon twenty and seven 
thousand men. 
Moses and the Engineers 


In this frightful struggle we are constantly being told that 
victory is all a question of the greatest number of men. They 
say the largest armies will win. But Israel, when “like two 
little flocks of kids” before the stupendous hosts of the 
Syrians, went forth and slew one hundred thousand footmen 
in a day. Which of us has not pictured the enormous masses 
of infantry waiting the signal for advance while the gigantic 
guns were preparing the way, but when have we read of a 
general waiting for such a sign as the Lord gave to David 
when he heard the “sound of going in tops of the mulberry 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 57 


trees.’ Everywhere people have talked about the policy of 
“frightfulness” with which the opposing forces of Europe 
have tried to shake each other’s nerves and destroy each 
other’s “morale,” but they’ve got nothing on Gideon, who, 
with a handful of men, a few broken pitchers and some 
lighted candles, scared a great army out of its wits. You see, 
on that occasion the sword was the Lord’s as well as Gideon’s. 
And talk about the destructive power of the magazine rifle, 
why, it isn’t in it with that ass’s jaw-bone before whose mur- 
derous sweep, in the hand of Samson, a thousand men went 
down; but back of Samson’s hand was the “Spirit of the 
Lord,” and that makes all the difference. I tell you that if 
the bullets from only a quarter of the rifles sent to Europe had 
flown as surely to the heart of the foe as David’s pebble was 
sent from his shepherd’s sling into the brain of Goliath, the 
execution on the battle-fields would have been a hundred 
times more ghastly than even it has been. But David was in 
the place where he could say, ‘“The Lord that delivered me 
out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, He 
will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine.” ‘Tell me, 
when have any of you opened your morning paper to read 
something like this in the war news: “And it came to pass 
that night, that the angel of the Lord went out and smote 
in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred and four score and 
five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, 
behold they were all dead corpses.’”? 


“The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold, 

His cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold; 

And the sheen of their spears were like stars on the sea, 
Where the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. 


“Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, 
That host with their banners at sunset was seen. 

Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown, 
That host on the morrow lay withered and strewn. 


1; Sam 17:37. 2? Kings 19:35. 


“ 


58 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


“For the angel of death spread his wings on the blast, 
And breathed on the face of the foe as he passed. 
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill, 
And their hearts but once beat, and forever grew still. 


“The widows of Asher are loud in their wail, 

And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal; 

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, 
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord.” 

You see all these armies and soldiers of Israel got these 
wonderful deliverances—conspicuous by their absence as re- 
gards modern armies—because they were God's armies act- 
ing as His instruments in the world, the defenders of His 
nation on earth, a nation which nowhere, as such, exists to- 
day. In that day God had a kingdom on earth. Its kings 
were appointed by Him: ‘He chose David also his servant 
and took him from the sheepfolds from following the ewes 
great with young, he brought him to feed Jacob, his people 
and Israel, his inheritance’—‘‘Then Solomon sat on the 
throne of the Lord”—“The kingdom of the Lord in the hand 
of the sons of David.” 


The Time for Conversion, Not Coercion 


Armies and kingdoms go together. Hence when the Jew- 
ish nation was dissolved and scattered, when her guilty peo- 
ple, because of their rebellion against Jehovah, were banished 
from the Promised Land as fugitives among foreigners, they 
ceased to be a nation, they ceased to have a king, and con- 
sequently they ceased to have an army. When they rejected 
their opportunity and mistook their Messiah for am impostor, 
impaling on a cross Him who was the rightful heir to their 
throne, then the Lord rebuked Peter’s final appeal to the 
sword at Gethsemane. I think I hear Him say, “Peter! 
put up that sword. I, your king, am about to leave you for 
a while. You have no longer a divine general to lead you 
to battle. You have no material kingdom to fight for, no 
country possible of defense by carnal instruments. ‘My 


1Ps, 78:70, 71. 1 Chron. 29:23. 2 Chron. 13:8. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 59 


kingdom is not of this world.’ Peter, take up the weapons 
of the Spirit and be a ‘fisher of men,’ and upon your wit- 
ness and devotion I will build something more precious to 
me than even my chosen nation, I will build my CHURCH, 
my Body, my Bride, and I will arm it so effectively with 
the ‘armor of light,’ with the invincible power of Jove, 
that ‘the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.’ ””? 

When the Jewish nation was suspended, God suspended 
war for His people. The Church to which we belong needs 
no weapons of steel either to protect her or to progress her 
cause in the world. She fights not against “‘flesh and blood,” 
but in opposition to those “principalities and powers’ en- 
trenched in the ‘heavenly places” around us; powers which 
lie back of and are the incentives to all evil in the hearts of 
men. Her effective weapon against these is the “sword of 
the Spirit, which is the Word of God.’? You cannot fight 
these “principalities and powers” with bayonets and forty-two 
centimeter guns. You might as well try to fight ignorance 
with gasoline. So far as His own people are concerned God 
has given material force its day and its appointed trial. It 
has served the purpose assigned to it in an age of dense dark- 
ness, and its day is over. God will never again coerce any 
man to obey His will till He Himself comes back to establish 
His earthly kingdom and to reign over the nations with a 
control so complete that it is likened to a rule of a “rod of 
iron.”® 

“The Sword of My Mouth” 


I do not myself believe, nor is there any reason for believ- 
ing, that He will ever again make use of the instruments we 
see employed on the battle-fields of today. Hosea, when 
speaking of the final restoration of Judah, prophesies: “But 
I will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save 
them by the Lord their God, and will not save them by 
bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, by horses, nor by horse- 


1Matt. 26:52; 16:18. 2Eph. 6:12, 17.  8Rey. 2:27. 


60 “THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


men.’? God has more effective and far more rapidly work- 
ing weapons than cumbersome cannon, shells and machine- 
guns. I have sometimes wondered if the uses made of poison 
gases during the late war may not be a forecasting in the 
material world, of that destructive force which God will em- 
ploy at Armageddon—of course with none of the horrible 
sufferings now witnessed in Europe—and which is so often 
described in the Bible as the “breath of the Almighty.” 
You will remember that when Annanias and Sapphira were 
stricken down with the lie on their lips, no material instru- 
ment was used. God seems to have just breathed on them 
and they expired. ‘That is the kind of “sword” He will 
use in the day of His power. I have carefully looked up 
all the references in the New Testament to the future use of 
the sword, in that time when the Lord returns for His final 
settlement with mankind, and I have been impressed with 
the sameness of the description always given. Have you 
noticed the suggestiveness of these expressions? 


“Out of His MOUTH went a two-edged sword’—“Out of His 
MOUTH goeth a sharp sword that with it He should smite the 
nations’—‘“The remnant were slain with the sword of Him which 
sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of HIS MOUTH” 
—‘Then shall that wicked be revealed whom the Lord shall con- 
sume with the spirit of His MOUTH and shall destroy with the 
BRIGHTNESS of His coming’—“Repent or else I will come to 
thee quickly and will fight against thee with the sword of my 
MOUTH”—“By the BLAST of God they perish and by the 
BREATH of His NOSTRILS are they consumed”’—“And He 
shall smite the earth with the rod of His MOUTH and with the 
BREATH of His lips shall He slay the wicked.”2 


The Sword and the Sacrifices 
So let us not forget that we can never defend war in this 
time of the Christian Church—this Dispensation of Grace— 
because of the precedent of Jewish wars during the Dis- 
pensation of Jaw. If we do this we must contend for other 
things which belong also to the Jewish Dispensation and on 


tHos, 1:7. *Rev. 1:16; 19:15, 21. 2 Thes. 2:8. Rev. 2:16. Job. 4:9. 
ies. 2% 28. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 61 


their adoption by the Christian Church. We must revive 
the Jewish ritual and ceremonial law; we must reinstate in 
the Christian code the seven death penalties of the Jewish 
law. We must kill men for committing adultery and for 
Sabbath-breaking as well as for national insult. No, the 
same act of redeeming love on Calvary which abolished these 
legalities, which was the fulfilment and verification of all 
these types and ceremonies, did away with war for the Chris- 
tian forever. 
God’s War Policy 

There is another conclusion to which, by the relentless 
force of logic, all Christians who defend war on the ground 
of Jewish precedent must be inevitably driven. In Old 
Testament times God’s wars with Israel’s enemies were so 
justifiable, so deserved by those with whom they were waged, 
so essential to the welfare of the world, that they were in- 
variably wars to the knife. ‘They were wars of merciless 
slaughter, of terrible and complete annihilation. If you 
would defend war for Christians by Jewish wars, go and 
read the twentieth chapter of Deuteronomy and see there 
the law of warfare for God’s armies and tell me if you are 
prepared to carry out the conditions insisted on. “The law of 
battle for Israel was absolute surrender, involving abject 
service or utter extermination. | How, for instance, would 
such an instruction as this sound when applied to the 
British armies as against Germany, or vice versa, “Of the 
cities of those people, which the Lord thy God doth give 
thee for an inheritance thou shalt save alive nothing that 
breatheth, thou shalt utterly destroy them.’! This was 
God’s policy of salvation by the sword in the hand of Israel. 
There was no talk of softening their sufferings and miti- 
gating the horrors of war in those battles. ‘There were 
no Red Cross contrivances to staunch the wounds inflicted 
by the sword in the hand of the Jew. God’s orders were 


Deut. 20:16, 17. 


62 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


imperatively strict, terribly severe. ‘‘Kill them all,” He 
commanded. Hence we read the results of those sanguinary 
battles in such expressions as these: “We utterly destroyed 
the men and the women and the little ones, of every city 
we left none to remain.”* ‘And we utterly destroyed all 
that were in the city, both man and woman, young and old.’” 
“So it was that all that fell that day, both of men and 
women, were twelve thousand, even all the men of Aji.’ 
“And they smote all the souls that were therein with the 
edge of the sword . . . neither left they any to breathe.” 
“Go,” said the Lord to Saul, “go and smite Amalek, and 
utterly destroy all that they have and spare them not; but 
slay both man and woman, infant and suckling.’”® ‘And 
David smote the land and left neither man nor woman 
alive.’’® 
Killing the Kings 

Nor must it be forgotten that when the Lord went to war 
He didn’t punish everybody in the opposing army but the 
most guilty ones. He went for the kings as well as the 
captains. Pharaoh was drowned with his hosts in the Red 
Sea. Joshua hanged the five kings of the Amorites. Sihon, 
king of Heshbon, Og, king of Bashan, Agag, king of the 
Amalekites, were all put to the sword. ‘The kings of those 
days who led their armies against the Lord of Hosts were 
not allowed to escape the horror they had brought on their 
followers by being treated with the customary respect which 
nowadays is always paid to the majesty of crowned heads. 
‘They were not let off with the loss of a little territory and 
the infliction of taxation, which their peoples had to pay 
while they resumed their domination. Nor were they, like 
Napoleon, merely confined amidst every luxury for the rest 
of their days. No, they were hanged with little ceremony 
and in double-quick time. And when some sympathetic 
general of those days took it into his head to show respect 


1Deut. 2:34. *Josh. 6:21. *Josh. 8:25. ‘Jos. 11:11, 14. 5r Sam. 15:3. 
*; Sam. 27:9. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 63 


to one of those kings by sparing his life, the Lord quickly 
brought him to account: ‘Thus saith the Lord,” said the 
prophet to King Ahab, “because thou hast let go out of thy 
hand a man whom I appointed to utter destruction, there- 
fore thy life shall go for his life,’’ 

All this shows that the Lord was dealing according to His 
ommniscience with nations which were utterly corrupt, en- 
grossed in the filthiest idolatry and guilty of the fiercest 
cruelty. He had chosen Israel as the nation through which 
He would establish His authority and execute His judg- 
ments on the earth. The Christian who justifies war on the 
grounds of the warfare of the Jews must, to be consistent, 
make a thorough job of his slaughtering. He must go all 
the way with those old warriors and fling to the winds all 
idea of “merciful fighting.” In this respect perhaps the 
German armies, supported by their militant Churches, have 
come the nearest to consistency. The Kaiser, though a pro- 
fessed Christian, put himself back in the place of Joshua. He 
regarded himself as God’s vicegerent sent to teach and to 
punish other nations. “Remember,” he said, “that the Ger- 
man people are chosen of God. On me, as German Em- 
peror, the Spirit of God has descended, I am His weapon.” 
Hence the German “‘frightfulness.” For the Kaiser this was 
the fatal mistake but for Joshua, God’s chosen Jewish leader 
it was permissable, for whatever God does He does right- 
eously and thoroughly. When He takes the sword He wields 
it with the utmost integrity and He uses it to the uttermost 
extent. [here were no half measures in God’s plans of 
military procedure. ‘They were methods of crushing annihi- 
lating slaughter or of universal overwhelming grace. But 
for His Church, war is gone and grace is supreme. 


Abraham’s Slaughter 
- But it is asserted by some Bible teachers that there is one 
incident at least in the Old Testament which justifies war 


1x Kings 20:42. 


64 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


for the Christian. ‘This is the story of Abraham’s conquest 
of the five kings of Canmaan.t The fact, they say, that 
Abraham was under the Covenant of Promise, that he “looked 
for a city” in the heavens, that his victory was achieved 
prior to the existence of Israel as a nation, that he was met 
after his slaughter of the kings by Melchizedek, the King 
of Salem, type of Christ’s eternal priesthood, and that his 
warfare was approved by this King of Salem, to whom he 
offered tithes of all he had taken in battle; these facts, they 
say, carry with them justification for the Christian Church’s 
participation in war. With every respect for these revered 
brethren, it is difficult to see the strength of this argument. 
It is not at all in harmony with their own teaching. Let us 
look carefully into the incident. In the first place, though 
it is true that Abraham was under the Covenant of Promise, 
it is equally true that this same pledge made him the father 
of the Jewish nation. ‘This Covenant of Promise guaranteed 
to him and his seed, not only the coming Saviour, but the 
inheritance of the Promised Land, which, of course, also 
carried with it the conquest of the heathen nations then oc- 
cupying it. Among those nations were those of the kings 
he went out to slay. Hence Abraham was in an entirely 
different situation to that which the Church occupies today. 
The Christian Church has never been promised the posses- 
sion of Palestine in this dispensation, nor has there been 
handed to her the title deeds of any territory which would 
warrant her in drawing the sword in order to destroy those 
occupying any such territory. 


The Father of Israel 

The Covenant of Promise God made with Abraham as- 
sured him of two classes of blessings. First temporal—‘I 
will make of thee a great nation” —‘“Unto thy seed will I 
give this land;” and second spiritual, “In thee shall all 
families of the earth be blessed.”? “The material guarantees 
were essential for, and led along into, the spiritual blessings. 
The Jewish nation in its earthly form was necessary to the 

1Gen. 14:1-24. Gen. 12:2, 3, 7. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 65 


coming of the promised “seed’”—Christ the Saviour—and to 
the realization of the new Covenant of Grace. Nothing 
could be clearer and more emphatic than this covenant which 
God made with Abraham concerning the gift of this earthly 
possession and the establishment, through his seed, of this 
earthly kingdom. It is three times asserted in the strongest 
possible language. ‘This covenant has already been par- 
tially realized in Israel’s history and will be completely 
fulfilled at the Lord’s return. After Abraham’s final 
separation with Lot, the word of the Lord came 
to him and said, “Lift up now thine eyes and look 
from the place where thou art northward and southward 
and eastward and westward: for all the land which thou 
seeest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed forever’— 
“Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in 
the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee.’1 And so we 
see that the land of Canaan was already deeded to Abraham’s 
seed when Lot separated from him to settle on the plains of 
Jordan. By God-given right Abraham held through his pre- 
dicted posterity the fee-simple, not only of that whole valley, 
but of the city of Sndom itself. It was therefore by his per- 
mission that Lot settled there, and for that reason, being on 
property pledged to Abraham’s seed, he was under his pro- 
tection. ‘This explains why it was that Abraham made 
war on those five kings when they attacked Lot and carried 
his belongings away. They were challenging Abra- 
ham’s rights and insulting Lot, his representative, and 
since he Abraham, stood in the relationship of God’s trustee 
for that land, they were attacking Jehovah. It was not 
because Lot in his own right had any claim on the cove- 
nanted blessings that Abraham went to his assistance. He 
was outside that covenant because he was not of the seed of 
Abraham. He was only his nephew. But he was there as 
the man, God’s representative had placed in that position, 
and to insult him was an affront to that representative, and 
4Gen. 13:14, 15, 16, 17. 


66 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


through him to the God of Israel. The title-deeds were 
assailed and Abraham went out to defend them. 

This view is remarkably confirmed by the blessing which 
Melchizedek pronounced upon Abraham. That blessing em- 
phasized the fact that Abraham was the representative of 
the “most high God,” who is for the first time described as 
the “possessor of heaven and earth.’ ‘The land, therefore, 
of Canaan was declared to be the Lord’s to give to the seed 
of His servant Abraham as the heritage of His coming chosen 
nation, and it was He who had delivered into Abraham’s 
hand the enemies of Lot, since Lot had been granted by 
God’s appointed trustee the right to settle in the valley of 
Jordan. | 

This also would appear to be the reason why Abraham 
was so careful to avoid anything that might compromise him 
with the King of Sodom. He rebuffed his patronizing 
flattery. He would not be placed in a false position. He 
needed nothing from the King of Sodom, nor would he be 
under any obligation to him, lest he should say, “I have made 
Abraham rich.” He did not want his gifts for the simple 
reason that all that the King of Sodom possessed was by 
divine decree already pledged to his seed. “I have lift up my 
hand unto the Lord, the most high God, the possessor of 
heaven and earth, that I will not take from a thread even to 
a shoelatchet, and that I will not take anything that is thine 
lest thou shouldest say, I have made Abraham rich.’ Abra- 
ham had no occasion to take from earthly kings what God 
had already promised, but he was scrupulously careful to 
give tithes as an offering to God, from Whom he had re- 
ceived the pledge of the Promised Land. . 

Then we read that “after these things” the word of the 
Lord came again to Abraham, as if once more to justify his 
fighting, on the ground of his position as the founder of the 
Jewish nation, and He said, “Unto thy seed have I given this 
land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river 
Euphrates.’ 

tGen. 14:22, 23. *Gen. 15:18. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 67 


Abraham, Gideon and Levi 

Another point to be observed concerning Abraham’s bat- 
tle is its miraculous nature. It bears a striking resemblance 
to the victory of Gideon. ‘The forces Abraham took with 
him numbered only three hundred and eighteen men. “They 
were his trained servants “born in his own house.’ Only by 
such supernatural interventions as characterized the oper- 
ations of the armies of Israel could there have been wrought 
such a victory over the hosts of five kings as Abraham 
achieved under such unfavorable conditions. Sure enough, 
his little force was the advance guard of the national armies 
of God’s kingdom on earth. As such both he and they were 
justified in fighting. ; 

Again, the war advocates forget that just as Abraham 
was the recipient of the twofold blessing—material and 
spiritual—so two distinct priesthoods were to spring from 
his seed.. While it is of course true that Melchizedek was 
pre-eminently the type of Christ’s eternal priesthood—‘like 
unto the Son of God”—‘not after the law of a carnal com- 
mandment, but after the power of an endless life’!—‘‘a 
priest continually,”? yet when he blessed Abraham he also 
officially recognized the calling and functions of the Jewish 
nation with its armies, and the Levitical priesthood, whose 
services at the altar prefigured the Redeemer. For, from 
Abraham was to come, not only this promised Saviour, in 
the fulness of time—the Great High Priest offering Him- 
self as the all-sufficient sacrifice—but also the God-ordained 
Aaronic priesthood of the Tabernacle whose ritual and 
offerings were types of “the Lamb of God which taketh 
away the sin of the world.” 

When, therefore, Melchizedek gave his blessing to Abra- 
ham he did so, not only because Abraham was the ancester 
of the Lord Jesus, but because he was the “father of the 
faithful.” He addressed himself to that chosen people who, 
whether prophets foretelling Christ, or kings wielding God’s 


1Heb. 7:16. *Heb. 7:3, 16. 


68 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


sword of justice, or as ministers of the Temple offering sacri- 
fices, were all divinely appointed to prepare the way for 
the sacrificial work of the Cross represented by the offered 
“bread and wine.” ‘The fact that Melchizedek gave his 
blessing to the whole Levitical priesthood when he blessed 
Abraham is proved by the assertion in the epistle to the 
Hebrews that Levi “paid tithes in Abraham” and was 
already “in the loins of his father’? when the Patriarch and 
Melchizedek met together. His sanction of Abraham’s 
slaughter of the five kings, then, concerned the Jewish 
Church and the armies of Israel, which were inseparably 
associated. 


King of Righteousness: King of Peace 

Note, too, the careful description given of Melchizedek 
in the epistle to the Hebrews and see how it confirms this 
view. Concerning his office as “priest of the Most High 
God” he is set forth as having two characteristics. We read: 
“This Melchizedek . . . first being by interpretation King 
of righteousness and after that also King of Salem, which 
is King of peace.” Here the office of Melchizedek repre- 
sents God’s dispensational dealing with the world. It begins 
by establishing righteousness—“King of righteousness,” it 
culminates in establishing peace—“King of peace.” First, 
there is the righteousness which is by the law, “our school- 
master to bring us to Christ”? by means of typical sacri- 
fices and the execution of wars, “after that,’ there is “peace” 
—the better offering once for all, setting aside the blood of 
“goats and calves,” as also the blood-shedding by the sword, 
and bringing in the Kingdom, which in this Church age is 
in its mystery form, and is “within you”—‘righteousness 
and peace and joy,” not by the compulsion of arms, but 
“in the Holy Ghost.”* ‘King of righteousness” for the 
Jewish Dispensation! ‘King of peace” for the Christian 
age. 


1Heb. 7:2. Gal. 3:24. *Rom. 14:17. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 69 


The twofold characteristic of Melchizedek’s Order also 
indicates God’s future dealing with the world when our 
Great High Priest, “after the order of Melchizedek,” shall 
once more appear in the heavens as the Establisher of right- 
eousness—‘‘King of righteousness.” Christ as King of right- 
eousness is to come as the executor of judgment, resorting 
again, at the close of this Church age, to force, by the em- 
ployment of His supernatural powers, exacting vengeance 
on unbelievers, and “after that’ He is once more to estab- 
lish Himself as “King of Salem’—‘Prince of peace,” reign- 
ing in majesty over a millennial empire, in which ‘‘nation 
shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they 
learn war any more.” 


So let us ever recollect that we are not Old Testament 
Jews, but New Testament Christians. We are the mem- 
bers of that Church which can have no justifiable dealings 
with the bloody armies of this age. The Church fights with 
celestial not “terrestrial forces “for though we walk in 
the flesh we do not war after the flesh, for the weapons of 
our warfare are not carnal but mighty through ie 
through what? ‘Through the keenness of their edge, the 
breadth of their mouths, the deceitfulness of their approach 
or the force of their disruption? NO! No! —‘mighty 
through GOD.”? ‘The weapons of our warfare are not 
fashioned by the skill of an Armstrong or a Krupp. “They 
are the product of the heavenly armories. Money won't 
buy them; sweat of brow won’t create them; they are ob- 
tained only by believing prayer, by dauntless faith. But 
you just propose to one of the governments when fighting 
that they should organize a week of prayer and see how they 
will laugh at you as an idiot, or a crank! What use have 
the armies of the nations of today for prayer? With them 
such a supplication is mere sentimental palaver relegated to 
“chaplains” sworn to pray for the enemy’s damnation, and 





‘lag ata. +2 Cor. 1024. 


70 SHE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


paid to make the Bible fit in with lying and spying and 
“heroic” murder by a jugglery that would do honor to a 
Hindoo magician! 


The Sword in the New Testament 


But it may be answered that there are certain passages in 
the New Testament which seem to justify the use of the 
sword by the Church. Too this I reply, if the passages in 
question are read carelessly, if they are given a superficial 
interpretation, this would appear to be so; but thoughtful 
study, intelligent comparing of Scripture with Scripture, 
renders these few isolated, much prized texts of modern fire- 
eaters, as dangerous to their theory as is the whole spirit of 
the New Testament. We shall now examine some of these 
passages and others as we proceed. 

If the codes of constitutional law were treated as some 
Christian defenders of bloodshed interpret the New Testa- 
ment, the justice administered by our courts would be a long 
way from equity. National and state law is not interpreted 
by one or two exceptional and obscure pieces of legislation, 
relating to complex conditions, whose general application 
would be diametrically opposed to the whole trend and pro- 
vision of the judicial system. ‘The apparent exceptions are 
governed by the general rule, not the rule by the exceptions. 
Just so we must treat the New Testament. We must be 
guided by the general sweep of its teaching; and the general 
trend of the New Testament is overwhelmingly for love, 
gentleness, forgiveness, peace. | 


Recently I made a careful examination of all the passages 
in the New Testament where the word “sword” is used. I 
found there were twenty-two. Six of these referred to its 
future employment in the way I have already explained. 
Three times it is used as a figure of speech; on five occa: 
sions the reference is to those who wielded it as the opponents 
of Christianity; twice it is referred to as a weapon of the 
powers of darkness; once where judgment on the world is 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD m1 


predicted by its employment; twice when the sword of the 
Spirit is spoken of, and three times in such a Way as, when 
wrested from the context, the reading might afford an argu- 
ment for its use by the Church. Two of these have reference 
to the same incident when Christ first appears to sanction it, 
and then told Peter to put it back into its scabbard. Since 
these three references are the passages ever used to assail our 
position in this matter I want to refer to two of them here. 
The other I refer to later... The passages are: ‘He that 
hath no sword let him sell his cloak and buy one,” and the 
other is, “Here are two swords, and he said, It is enough.’’ 


The “Cloak and Sword” Passage 

First let me say with all possible emphasis that if Christ 
was here justifying the use of the material sword for the 
offensive and defensive purposes of His Church, then He 
was flatly and flagrantly contradicting all His teachings as 
recorded in. all the Gospels. This we know He could not 
do, and we are therefore bound to discover some other in- 
terpretation for His words on this occasion. These are 
admittedly difficult passages, but they are not a whit more 
obscure than others in the Bible which, if superficially inter- 
preted, would seem to abrogate the doctrines of the atone- 
ment and the deity of our Lord. 

I am now venturing on an interpretation which I have 
not seen elsewhere, though I have studied many commen- 
taries on these texts. Let us read carefully these passages 
with their contexts, including the incidents in Gethsemane 
with which they are immediately connected. I take the rec- 
ord from the Revised Version, as given in Dr. Broadus’s 
“Harmony of the Gospels,” and thus obtain the fullest ac- 
count, compiled from the record of the four Evangelists: 


“And he said unto them, When I sent you forth without purse 
and wallet and shoes, lacked ye anything? And they said, Noth- 
ing. And he said unto them, But now, he that hath a purse let 
him take it, and likewise a wallet; and he that hath no sword, let 
him sell his cloak, and buy one. For I say unto you, that this 

1See pages 260 to 266. Luke 22:36-38. 


72 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


which is written must be fulfilled in me, and he was reckoned with 
transgressors: (or lawless ones) for that which concerneth me 
hath fulfilment. And they said, Lord, behold, here are two swords. 
And he said unto them, It is enough..... 2 

“And while he yet spake, lo, Judas, one of the twelve came, 
and with him a great multitude with swords and staves, from the 
chief priests and elders of the people. Jesus, therefore, knowing 
all things that were coming upon him, went forth, and saith unto 
them, Whom seek ye? They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. 
Jesus saith unto them, I am he. And Judas also which betrayed 
him, was standing wth them. When therefore he said unto them, 
I am he, they went backward and fell to the ground. Again 
therefore he asked them, Whom seek ye? And they said, Jesus of 
Nazareth. Jesus answered, I told you that I am he; if therefore 
ye seek me, let these go their way; that the word might be fulfilled 
which he spake, Of those whom thou hast given me I lost not 
one.” 

“Now he that betrayed him gave them a sign, saying, Whomso- 
ever I shall kiss, that is he; take him, and lead him away safely. 
And when he was come, straightway he came to Jesus and said, 
Hail, Rabbi, and kissed him, but Jesus said unto him, Judas, be- 
trayest thou the Son of man with a kiss. . . . Friend, do that for 
which thou art come. Then they came and laid hands on Jesus, 
and took him.... And when they that were about him saw what 
would follow, they said, Lord, shall we smite with the sword? 
Simon Peter therefore having a sword drew it, and struck the 
High Priest’s servant and cut off his right ear. Then saith Jesus 
unto him, Put again thy sword into its place: for all they that take 
the sword shall perish with the sword. Or thinkest thou that I 
cannot beseech my Father, and he shall even now send me more 
than twelve legions of angels? How then should the Scriptures 
be fulfilled that thus it must be? In that hour said Jesus to the 
multitude, are ye come out as against a robber with swords and 
staves to seize me? [I sat daily in the Temple teaching, and ye 
took me not. But all this is come to pass that the Scriptures of 
the prophets might be fulfilled.” 


Christ Himself the Interpreter 


When considering this “sword and cloak” passage keep 
your mind centered on the reason which Christ Himself gave 
for this injunction. He was thinking about prophecy. Ac- 
cording to His words, the reason for this advice to “buy a 
sword” was in order that a certain prophecy should be ful- 
filled. Do not forget the great importance the Lord always 
attached to the exact realization of all the prophecies con- 
cerning Himself. Again and again, along the history of His 


— 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 73 


life, we have the recurring phrase “that it might be fulfilled 
which was spoken of the Lord by the prophets.” 

As our Lord approached His great sacrificial work, the 
indications of His regard for divine prediction were increas- 
ingly apparent. ‘Taking the account of the four Gospels 
just given, it is strikingly evidenced that Jesus had con- 
stantly before Him the importance of guiding His conduct 
by the word of prophecy, which of course was His own 
eternal decree, as also the decree of His Father. Hence, 
during these final hours we have such expressions as these, 
“The Son of Man indeed goeth, as it is written of him.” 
When refusing the assistance of angelic hosts we hear Jesus 
saying, ‘‘How then shall the Scriptures be fulfilled that thus 
it must be?” When addressing His assaulters in Gethsemane 
he declared, “But the Scriptures must be fulfilled.” Again it 
is said that “Jesus, knowing all things that should come 
upon Him, went forth.” And once more, when He told 
those who arrested Him to let His disciples go free, He knew 
He was fulfilling the prophet’s saying, “Of those which thou 
gavest me I have lost not one.” 

Now in connection with His Gethsemane experience there 
were two unfulfilled prophecies which could only be realized 
by the permission and command of Christ Himself. One of 
these related to His personal arrest, the other predicted that 
He should be reckoned with “lawless ones” or “trans- 
gressors.” It is a striking coincidence that these two per- 
missions or commands, given by the Lord, involved a 
seeming contradiction of His previous teachings. His words 
on these occasions, if wrested from their contexts and con- 
sidered without proper regard for the position of the Speaker, 
and the circumstances under which they were spoken, would 
not only make Him contradict Himself, but would make 
Him sanction, on the one hand, the betrayal of the innocent 
—traitorship; and on the other, a recourse to bloodshed in 
the warfare of His Church—militarism. 


74 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Christ as a Jew and as a Christian 


The solution of the problem lies in a careful recognition 


of the fact that Jesus stood in the dual relationship of King — 


of the Jews, finisher of the Old Dispensation, and also in 
that of divine Saviour of the world, founder and head of 
the Church, in the New Dispensation of Grace. Do not 
forget that just as He was God and man, speaking sometimes 
from the standpoint of His humanity and at other times by 
the authority of His deity, so while His message and His 
wonderful sacrifice were primarily to usher in the Church 
Dispensation, He was Himself, in His humanity side, a Jew 
under the Old Dispensation law, which he scrupulously com- 
plied with, and which dispensation did not close till His 
cry, “It is finished,’ rang out from the cross and He rose 
from the dead. Unless, therefore, His words are “rightly 
divided,” some of the things He said which referred to the 
Old Dispensation would seem to conflict with other of His 
utterances which concerned the New Dispensation. If, 
however, these sayings of His are properly placed, there is 
the most perfect and wonderful harmony. 

Let us then take the last of the two assertions in Gethsem- 
ane we are dealing with first. This will help us to better 
understand the other about the sword, and which is our 
chief concern for the moment. Saint John tells us that when 
Judas and the mob approached the Lord and when He ad- 
vanced to meet them with the assertion, “I am he,” some- 
thing from His divine majesty smote them into inactivity ; 
“they went backward and fell to the ground.” Something 
apparently had to be done by Christ Himself before they 
could accomplish their shameful deed and drag this royal 
Sovereign of heaven—upon whose pleasure their lives de- 
pended—before His murderers. I know of no other record 
in the New Testament where, up to that time, any rude 
hands were ever laid upon Christ. Without His sanction 
it could not be. But “Jesus knowing all things that should 


Es 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 75 


come upon him” gave Judas the permission by a command, 
without which it would have been impossible for him and his 
accomplices to carry into effect the deed, which in their 
hearts they had already perpetrated, which was, in fact, 
already sealed by the guilty kiss of the traitor, “Then they 
came and laid hands on Jesus.” 

According to the revised version of this passage, which is 
also confirmed by Dr. Weymouth’s, Dr. Moffatt’s, Louis 
Segond’s and other translations, Christ turned to Judas and 
said, “Friend, do that for which thou art come.’ Here, 
then, Jesus was apparently telling Judas to carry into effect 
the plot for His murder, but in reality He was yielding Him- 
self to His Father’s will by laying aside those protecting 
powers of His deity which, had they been exercised, would 
have made it impossible for His murderers to take Him to 
judgment and the cross. This explains His saying, “But this 
is your hour and the power of darkness.”* And mark well 
“All this,” says Matthew, “‘came to pass that the Scriptures 
of the prophets might be fulfilled.’’ 


He Was Reckoned with Lawless Ones 


The second of these injunctions, which also concerned 
what was to happen in Gethsemane, contains Christ’s ap- 
parent sanction of bloodshed in His service, ““He that hath 
no sword let him sell his cloak and buy one.” ‘This also 
related to a prophecy which had to be fulfilled in the clos- 
ing hours of Christ’s ministry on earth. It was a prophecy 
that He should be reckoned with “transgressors” or “lawless 
ones,” that in some way “‘lawlessness,”’ as well as ““meekness”’ 
and “humiliation,” should be associated with Him in His 
death. "Those He had hitherto made His companions had 
not as yet done anything that could justify any one in class- 
ing them as criminals. They had moved among the people 
without violence of any kind, sojourning peacefully in the 
homes of those who had received them. With the utmost 


1Luke 22:53. ?Matt. 26:56. 


— 


76 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


humility they had proclaimed the gospel of the Sermon on 
the Mount. ‘This was evidenced by the way they had been 
treated, for they had lacked nothing. Up to these last mo- 
ments, therefore, it could not be truthfully asserted that 
Jesus had been the leader of lawless transgressors. While 
it is true that on the cross, when He hung between the two 
thieves, He was “numbered with the transgressors,” in the 
sense that He shared their shame and their penalty, yet He 
had never been actually associated with those thieves in their 
breach of the law. It was necessary, therefore, if this proph- 
ecy was to be literally fulfilled and the Scriptures not be 
broken, that His own chosen companions, His disciples, 
should be guilty, as regards the Roman law, to which Israel 
was then in bondage, of some special act of “lawlessness.” 

But how should this be brought about in face of the teach- 
ing which Christ had always given these men? As the herald 
of the Church age of victory by the power of love and with 
the weapons of the Spirit, He had spared no effort to show 
them that the use of force for progressing His cause, was 
fundamentally opposed to the spirit of the Church which 
they were to establish in the world. He had rebuked them 
as not knowing of what spirit they were when they appealed 
to vengeance.! He had just been telling them of the suffer- 
ings which He Himself was about to endure without com- 
plaint or resistance. How, then, could this prophecy con- 
cerning “lawlessness” be fulfilled? 


Rebels Against Cesar 


Yt seems to me that Christ saw quite clearly that which, 
on reflection, we too must see. He saw that such a fulfil- 
ment could only transpire by His permission for the transac- 
tion of some deed which, though opposed to the principle of 
the coming age, was allowable by virture of His right and 
title as “King of the Jews.” For His disciples to assert those 
rights and draw the sword in defense of His kingship, was 


tLuke 9:54, 55- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 7 


an act of treason against the Roman government and would 
at once, under the Roman law, put Him in the position of 
a rebel leader and them in the place of “lawless transgressors” 
against Cesar. ‘This is exactly what He was charged with 
being’ and it was concerning this, Pilate so carefully ques- 
tioned Him—‘“Art thou then a king?” Nor must we 
forget that the superscription which Pilate nailed above His 
thorn-crowned brow, as the warrant of justification for 
allowing Jesus to be crucified, was, “King of the Jews;” 
which was much the same as saying, “‘Rebel against Cesar.” 

Thus we see Christ, for the purpose of carrying out this 
prophecy, first reminding the disciples of the fact that they 
were NOT, as regards their future ministry in the Church, 
to forget His principles of meekness and love, which, already 
at his command, they had proved to be so abundantly effec- 
tive—“When I sent you forth without purse and wallet 
and shoes lacked ye anything? And they said, Nothing.” 
And then we see Him placing them where, up to that mo- 
ment they in fact belonged—under the Jewish Dispensation, 
as loyal Jews in the presence of Christ their rightful King. 
They were His subjects, they still expected that He would, 
in some way, deliver them from the galling yoke of Roman 
bondage, and they had therefore not only the right but were, 
in the Israelitish sense, under obligation to fight for Him. 

Hence the Saviour permitted these disciples to act under 
the sanctions of their divinely ordained law—the law of the 
Jewish nation, the law of the material kingdom of earthly 
prosperity, established and extended by physical force. He 
told them to take for the moment their purses and their 
provision-bags, and since the fulfilment of Scripture was 
more important than all else, to sell even their cloaks if 
necessary in order to buy a sword. ‘Thus when the great 
moment for Christ’s betrayal came they were so situated as 
to be able to fulfil exactly this prophecy without being guilty 
before God. Under the Roman law, by which their Saviour 


1John 19:12. 


78 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


was to suffer death, they would be criminals, concerned at 
the moment no longer with only heavenly things, but, like 
insurrectionists, trusting in temporal possessions and relying 
on the sword, which no private Jewish citizen had a right to 
bear; but under the Divine law of their own nation they 
would be completely justified in defending their rightful 
king. Knowing this, and knowing full well the use that 
Peter would presently make of the sword, and that without 
the sword the prophecy could not be fulfilled, Jesus said, 
“But NOW” (for this occasion, under this dispensation, 
for this purpose)—‘“He that hath none let him sell his 
garment and buy a sword’—Why? “for” (and I always 
take that preposition to be the key to the passage—‘‘for’”— 
in other words because—‘‘this I say unto you that yet” (it 
it something as yet not realized) “this that has been written 
concerning me” (this classing with lawless ones) “must be 
accomplished in me for also that” (“that’—that particular 


prophecy) “concerning me has an end” (some important — 


reason for its fulfilment) or, as the Revised Version has it, 
“that which concerneth me hath fulfilment.” 


“Put Up Thy Sword” 

I think this interpretation is fully confirmed by what 
immediately follows. We read, ‘And they said unto him, 
Lord, here are two swords. And he said unto them, It is 
enough.” Had He intended to imply that two swords were 
“enough” to arm twelve men, so as to render them equal 
to an impending struggle with a “multitude armed with 
swords and staves,” he would have said something which, 
in the estimation of all men, would have been an absurdity, 
aye, even more it would have been untrue. But speaking, 
as I believe he was, solely with a view to the fulfilment of 


prophecy, He said what was in line both with reason and with — 
fact. ‘Two swords were quite sufficient to enable His disciples — 
to bring themselves into the position of lawless transgressors — 


against the Roman law, and by doing so to insure that noth- 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 79 


ing might be lacking in the ungainsayable witness of prophecy 
to His great mission. 

And when in Gethsemane the momentous transaction of 
His arrest took place, the events are still more favorable 
to this interpretation of the passage. When the soldiers 
with the mob arrived and the disciples saw what was going 
to happen, they put the question, “Shall we smite with the 
sword?” and without waiting for reply, Peter struck off the 
ear of the High Priest’s servant, exactly as Jesus had known 
he would do. Then Jesus seeing in this act the fulfilment 
of this particular prophecy, immediately stopped him going 
further by His words—“Suffer ye thus far,’ as if to say, 
“The use of the sword as a tribute to My earthly Kingship 
and in fulfilment of this particular prophecy, has My sanc- 
tion, but henceforth the sword in defense of Me has played 
its part’”—‘Put up thy sword into its place, for all they 
that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” After 
that He touched the servant’s ear with the impress of divine 
and apostolic healing and went forth to usher in the Church 
age of universal love and non-resistance. So then, to put 
the whole question in a sentence, when Christ said, “Buy a 
sword,” He spoke as a Jew who had just eaten the Pass- 
over, the great symbolic feast of the Jewish nation; but when 
He said, “Put up thy sword,” He spoke as a Christian who 
had just instituted the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, the 
symbolic ordinance of the Christian Church in the New 
Dispensation. 

Peter and Cornelius 


Again it is urged that in the New Testament, incidents 
are recorded where both Christ and the apostles had deal- 
ings with soldiers and never denounced their profession but, 
on the contrary, appeared to approve it by giving them their 
blessings or admitting them into the Church. The case of 
Cornelius is especially referred to.1 Let us examine it. 


1Act. ro. 


— 


80 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Here again dispensational interpretation is vital to a cor- 
rect understanding of this earliest chapter in Christian his- 
tory. 

In the first place, I would remind you that Cornelius was 
a Roman military officer who from his boyhood had been 
trained in the Roman ideas of the nobility of self-defense, 
achievement by fighting. But he was a Roman officer who 
had accepted up to this time, not the Christian, but the Jew- 
ish faith. He was serving the God of the Jew, who was 
also the God of battle—the God he knew had, in Israel’s 
history, marshaled His legions to greater victories than had 
ever perched on the banners of Rome. It was natural, there- 
fore, that he should see no inconsistency in his remaining a 
soldier if, as doubtless he was careful as a “devout man” to 
do, he consulted his conscience about the justice of the wars 
he was called to fight in. His eyes at this time were not 
opened to the Christian view of things. He was not a 
Christian at all before Peter’s visit to his house. He was a 
consistent religionist under the Jewish temple worship of 
the Old Dispensation. ‘This must have been so, for at that 
time there was no other standard by which in God’s sight 
he might have been considered “devout” and no other justi- 
fication for the assertion that “he feared God with all his 
house” and “gave much alms to the people and prayed 
always” and “fasted.” Nor did God give such visions as 
He gave to Cornelius to any but to His own people. He 
was, therefore, a Roman convert to the Jewish faith—a 
proselyte. The angel affirmed this when referring to Peter’s 
coming to him he said, ““Who shall tell thee words whereby 
thou and thy house shall be saved?” Hence, not being yet 
a Christian, he would have the Jewish ideas about war, even 
as many devout but unenlightened Christians, who are still 
to a certain degree under bondage to Old Testament tradi- 
tions, have today. ‘The fact, therefore, that Cornelius was 
a soldier before he believed in Christ is no argument at all 
in favor of a Christian going to war. What he did after his 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 81 


conversion we don’t know because we are not told. What 
we don’t know proves nothing. 


Peter Preached What He Wrote 

But in the story there are very strong indications of what 
Cornelius must have done after his conversion. ‘The angel 
had told him that Peter would give him his instructions— 
“He shall tell thee what thou oughtest to do.” We can 
easily judge the things Peter told him he “ought to do” 
about his profession as a soldier in the cruel armies of Rome, 
by what he says concerning peace, love and non-resistance in 
his epistles—by their salutations of grace and mercy, their 
insistence on a reviled but unreviling Christ as the example 
for all saints. Peter didn’t write one thing and preach 
another. 


Moreover, the record distinctly states the kind of preach- 
ing Peter preached in that house. It was a gospel which 
forever abolishes nearly everything which makes war possible 
on the part of those who accept it. The whole story breaks 
down and smashes to pieces those barriers of nationality, 
religious bigotry, pride of caste and greedy privilege, which 
lie at the root of every war ever waged. Peter himself had 
to learn that lesson quite as much, if not more than, Cor- 
nelius. ‘Ye know,” he said, “how that it is an unlawful 
thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company, or come unto 
one of another nation.” ‘There you have the spirit of racial 
antagonism. ‘The Jew under the Old Dispensation was a 
fighter against all other nations. “They were God’s enemies 
in his sight; to be isolated always—frequently to be resisted 
and slain. But God was showing Peter how, under the 
Christian order, all such distinctions were to be abolished ; 
for he goes on to say—‘“God hath shown me that I should 
not call any man common or unclean” —“‘God is no respecter 
of persons . . . in every nation he that feareth him and 
worketh righteousness is accepted with him.” All this 
applies just as much to national prejudice as it does to re- 


i 


82 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


ligious distinction. ‘This is the true gospel of international 
brotherhood and goodwill. More importantly it is the 
gospel which insists upon the unity of the body of believers 
regardless of nationality or color. It was a new kind of 
“patriotism” which recognized as fellow-citizens in the King- 
dom of God all those who throughout the whole world were 
believers in Christ. This is most surely an anti-war spirit. 
And again it is distinctly stated that Peter in that house 
was “preaching PEACE by Jesus Christ.” Peace does not 
go with a soldier’s profession. Nor was it peace by the 
SWORD, but by JESUS CHRIST. ‘“‘Jesus’”—Peter went 
on to explain to Cornelius—““Who went about doing good,” 
not blowing men’s heads off, but “healing all that were 
oppressed of the Devil.” ‘That was not the kind of a Christ 
Cornelius could accept and follow while at the same time 
marching out his “Italian band” to kill and destroy. 


Military Police 

Once more remember that Cornelius, like the centurion 
whose daughter was healed, and all the soldiers with whom 
Christ and the Apostles came into contact, were soldiers 
acting on police duty. In those days the soldiers were the 
police. ‘These particular soldiers were not engaged in war. 
They were in fact subject themselves to the strictest judicial 
system of civil government, at that time a juster govern- 
ment than the rule of the corrupt ecclesiastical authorities of 
the Jews. In this connection it is important to remember 
the injunction of John the Baptist—who, although under 
the Old Dispensation, was also the herald of the New Cove- 
nant—to the soldiers who asked him what they should do. 
He replied, “Do violence to no man, neither accuse any 
falsely; and be content with your wages.’* ‘These words 
were appropriate only to a police officer or a civil servant, 
and quite inapplicable to a soldier whose duty it is to “do 
violence,” who has nothing to do with “accusing” anybody, 


Luke 3:14. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 83 


but only to shoot those he is told without their being ‘‘ac- 
cused” at all, and who has no option but to take what is 
given him in “wages.” 

Note.—For other references to soldiers in the New Testament, see other 


aba of this book, also “How Militarism Murders Christ” by the same 
author. 


II. CARNAL WAR IS FORBIDDEN FOR THE 
CHURCH BECAUSE SHE IS TOLD TO 
FIGHT WITH THE WEAPONS OF 
LOVE 


Do not forget that when Christ cried from the cross, ole 
is finished,” He closed never to be re-established til] His re- 
turn, the old order of force, so far as His chosen people and 
His Church are concerned. Henceforth, in this intervening — 
period of grace, His interests were to be centered in His 
Church. That Church He armed with righteousness for her 
breastplate, with salvation for her helmet, with faith for her 
shield and with the Word of God, proclaimed from a Spirit- 
possessed heart, for her sword. 

The steel-clad heroes and the proud empire-builders of 
Rome, like the worldly diplomats of modern nations, had 
small use for “Christian soldiers” whose feet were to be 
shod with the “preparation of peace.” That was not the 
kind of “preparedness” they understood anything about. 
With a consistency which puts our modern “Christianity” 
to shame they said so boldly. Had they been able, as we are, 
to look back through eighteen centuries’ history of the Chris- 
tain Church, and thus to prove the power of the lowly Naz- 
arene’s Gospel, they would not, like us, have opened theit 
legislative assemblies with prayer to the “Prince of Peace” 
and then sat down to vote billions for the pursuit of war. 
The Romans were certainly cruel tyrants, but they were 
not religious humbugs. They didn’t prate about “good will 
toward men” with powder magazines for pulpits. They 
didn’t sing about the “‘all-conquering power of love” with 
the roar of six-inch guns for organ accompaniment. ‘They 
never expatiated upon the all-prevailing fire of the Holy Spirit 
while they were spitting fire of a very different kind from 


84 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 85 


forty-two centimeter shells. No, these Romans came right 
to the front without any sentimental religious fla-fla, and 
said straight out what many “leaders of the Church” have 
not the courage or the honesty to say today. “They declared 
they knew no God but the gods of lust, greed, hate, and 
war. They said with their lips what the quarreling states- 
men of so-called ‘‘Christian” nations have been saying the 
last fifty years, only by their selfish intrigues, their acts of 
violence. “They said that as for them, their trust was in 
the cunning of their diplomacy, the strength of their own 
right hands, the unreasoning might of their thundering 
legions. 


The Force of Arms and the Power of Love 


And truly the nations both of ancient and modern times, 
whose trust has been in the “arm of flesh,” have wrought 
achievements of a certain kind in the world. They have 
distinguished themselves, by the little better than cannibal 
savagery, with which they have eaten each other up. They 
have, by furious onslaughts, established dynasties which have 
in turn gone down before still more frantic fighting. ‘They 
have built up kingdoms on millions of dead men’s bones 
which, in due time have themselves been deluged in blood. 
True, they have by brute force succeeded in demolishing 
certain evils when it became profitable for them to do so. 
But other evils of even a worse nature have arisen to take 
their places. Giving, however, all credit to the things 
achieved by the principle of force, how do they compare with 
those achievements wrought by the power of Christ’s love, 
shed abroad in the hearts of men, since those men were sent 
forth into the world to overcome evil with good? 

Let us consider the verdict of history, that infallible, 
never-failing test for all the tenets of time. Why, history 
shows that the policy of Christ—the policy of patient love 
and self-sacrifice—has done for this old world a thousand- 


~ 


86 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


fold more than has ever been accomplished by the force of 
arms. 
The Saints versus the Soldiers 

Consider for a moment the witness to this fact from a 
geographical viewpoint. ‘lake a world-wide survey of those 
parts of the earth’s surface discovered since the days of 
Christ, and see how the influence of the Cross out-evidences 
the power of the sword. After whom are so many of the- 
features in this modern geography named? If you take 
all the cities, towns, villages; the lakes, rivers, roads and 
trails; the mountain peaks, the valleys, the plains—I venture 
to say you would find fifty of them bearing the names of the 
Saints where you would find only five called after the sol- 
diers. And if you take not only the centers of population, 
which bear the names of their saintly founders, but those 
also which have been christened in memory of places made 
precious because of associations which come only by faith 
and love, you would find but a small minority which do not 
pay tribute to the Saviour and His Gospel. 

Consider the power of love from the institutional stand- 
point. Add together the number and the influences of the 
institutions, founded since the days of the Saviour, by the 
efforts, or in memory of, the fighting chieftains, and com- 
pare the record with the number, splendor, the power of 
those established by the heralds of the Cross; why, you will 
find both, as regards their architecture and their potency, | 
that the humble servants of Jesus are in this matter out-of- 
sight ahead of the advocates of blood and iron. 


The Trail of Devotion 


Consider the power of love from the standpoint of adven- 
ture. Read the stories of the pioneers of this and every land, 
redeemed from savagery and disorder. Who has, in the vast 
majority of cases, led the way? Not the soldier, but the 
missionary. Not proud defiance in the breasts of armed bat- 
talions, but unfailing love, flaming fervor, self-consuming 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 87 


devotion, passion for lost souls, shed abroad in the hearts of 
the Soldiers of the Cross—these were the potent influences 
which opened the doors of the new world. They went to 
face the horrors of arctic cold or tropical heat, to lie with 
their lives in their hands in the pestilential wigwam of the 
savage, or press their way through the fever-stricken haunts 
of wild beasts, not because they sought to force their road 
to treasure or territory, but because they were led by the 
light that streams from Calvary. It was LOVE, then, more 
than FORCE, which blazed the trail through the darkness 


of heathendom for the so-called triumphs of civilization. 


The Prince of Peace 


Consider again the power of love from the standpoint of 
actual achievement. Look at a few of the victories wrought 
by those who dared to carry out the principles of the Sermon 
on the Mount. Begin with Him Who delivered that ser- 
mon. Christ in the face of the greatest wrong ever inflicted 
on mortal man, King of Kings though He was, with legions 
of angels at His disposal, submitted unresistingly to the most 
shameful insult and the cruelest murder. But think what 
Christ has become in the estimation, not only of countless 
saints, but in the thoughts of those who deny His claims on 
their allegiance—think what He has become today. No 
personality among the millions of men on the stage of his- 
tory can, without suffering eclipse, stand even in His shadow, 
or attempt to compete with the sway of His influence. He is 
the model of perfect manhood even with those who tear the 
crown of deity from His brow. His ethics are supreme, 
His system of government the ideal, His code of law the 
basic foundation for the judicial systems of every civilized 
nation. The sword of Cesar in the mailed fist of Pilate has 
for long centuries lost its sway over the hill where Jesus. 
dared to die without resistance, but the message of love, 
“Father, forgive them,’ which broke from His fevered 


~ 


88 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


lips on the cross, has achieved victories which will endure 
forever. 
The Army of Martyrs 

You can say almost the same of the Apostles. Possessing 
a heroism which made its mark on the then civilized world, 
they refused to defend themselves when in the villainous 
grasp of their destroyers; yet their courageous meekness has 
enshrined them in the hearts of tens of millions and spotted 
the earth with memorials to their fame. Look at the Mar- 
tyrs. They were tortured, slain, cast to the beasts, their 
women exposed to the greatest possible insult and shame, yet 
they never resisted. Had they resisted there would never have 
been any Church of Christ at all. It was their love for 
their enemies, their prayers in the arena for those who flung 
them to the lions, that won to Christianity thousands among 
the crowds in the galleries of the Colosseum, who came to 
see them die. 

Never did the Church make such progress as she did when 
she unresistingly endured the persecution of the first three 
centuries. Her fatal and forbidden alliance with that de- 
ceitful old Constantine and the rotton Roman state started 
her worst sorrows. She grasped the sword of steel and 
dropped the sharper sword of the Spirit. 


Light in the Dark Ages 


Coming along the dark ages there have ever been faithful, 
though small communities who have stood true to the teach- 
ings of Christ. The Waldensian and Moravian Churches, 
though among them there were sections that at times took 
the sword (always with disastrous results) for the most part 
gave the world a magnificent example of the nobility and 
power of patient passive resistance. A simple, honest people 
who, by going back to the teachings of Jesus, had extricated 
themselves from the meshes of an utterly corrupt ecclesi- 
asticism quickly became a spiritual force to be reckoned 
with. A horde of blood-sucking priests, supported by a 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 89 


mighty Church which had sold itself to the Devil, rose 
up to smash this new organization and to hush its preaching 
in the silence of the grave. ‘These patient disciples suffered, 
they died, they fled to the frost-bound heights of the Alps, but 
for the most part they never resisted. Love was their weapon. 
By love they conquered. Despite the stupendous influence 
and the terrible power of the Roman Church, which was 
used to the utmost to exterminate their lives, to destroy their 
literature, they held aloft the beacon-light of the Gospel 
in those midnight ages, became the pioneer missionary church 
of modern times and wrought achievements by which every 
other true Church is profiting today. 


The Franciscans 


In the next century the same light and the same message 
came to St. Francis, the clever, handsome son of the rich 
merchant of Assisi. Here was another who dared to believe 
that Jesus meant what He said and knew what He was 
talking about. Casting to the winds the jargon of the priests 
whose artful conjuring with the Sermon on the Mount dis- 
gusted him, and dispossessing himself of every earthly treas- 
ure, he went out into the world to prove that affection, gen- 
erosity, forgiveness, will do more for mankind than hatred, 
selfishness and revenge. How did he fare? What did he 
accomplish against the fabulous wealth of the Church, the 
pride and pomp of national power? Read the story of his 
life and his Order. No greater miracle was ever wrought 
under heaven. Drawn as by some unseen irresistible force, 
even millionaires and princes laid their fortunes at his feet. 
His followers grew till hardly a village in Italy had not 
turned out to listen to their preaching. ‘Their influence be- 
came so potent that almost every door, from the palace of 
the king to the peasant’s hut, flew open at their approach. 
To rich and poor alike the impress of their steps were as the 
footprints of angels. 

The forces of the Church’s material power, the power of 


90 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


staves and swords and spears; of armed cohorts marching 
off to the wars of the Crusades; of helmeted legions support- 
ing the throne of St. Peter, all this material power has 
proved a dismal failure for, today, the Mosque of Omar 
stands over the Holy Place at Jerusalem and the Pope is 
a prisoner within the Vatican, outside of whose walls he 
cannot command, for his defense, a single one of all the 
guns of Europe. But the influence of that patient faith and 
love in the breast of the saintly St. Francis will never die, 
and great cities like San Francisco, though sadly unfaithful 
to his creed, remain as monuments to his name. If only his 
followers had gone on in the way on which he started, then 
they would have done more for mankind than all the armies 
and navies of the world. Alas! they descended from 
spiritual power to rely on the force of material things, and 
their retrogression began at once. 


Quakers and Salvationists 

Coming to more modern times, the Quakers of the seven- 
teenth century dared to defy the militarism even of Oliver 
Cromwell. ‘Thousands of them were at one time in the 
prisons of England because they refused to kill their fellow- 
man. ‘Today you cannot point to a community more re- 
spected wherever they exist, and I have heard it said that in| 
proportion to their numbers, they are the richest people in 
the world. If you were to take the names of the greatest 
and best known commercial houses in England, you would 
be astonished to find what a large proportion of them were 
either founded or carried on by Quakers. ‘The exemption 
clauses in the conscription acts of England and America 
attest the influence of these once persecuted—once courageous 
people. 

Nor has that religious movement with which I was my- 
self so long associated, the Salvation Army, failed to estab- 
lish, in its earlier history, the fact that love will triumph 
where force will fail. What wonderful things I have seer 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD gI 


achieved by endurance for Christ and a passionate affection 
for the lost. In the days of its greatest spiritual power, the 
Army was slandered by the press and scorned by the Church, 
while the aristocracy of England classed its people with 
screeching fanatics and branded its leaders as unprincipled 
grafters. But we went on loving. We had a rule never to 
answer back. We always responded to the world’s spite by 
more self-sacrifice and service. “The more they kicked the 
better we preached. I don’t suppose there are many men 
who have been in more riots than I have. I don’t think any 
of you know better than I the sensation which comes when 
one is the object of hatred in a furious mob. But I want to 
testify that while I and those associated with me in those 
strenuous days kept our hands from striking back and our 
hearts filled with love, we always got through without seri- 
ous harm. Force on our part invariably spelled failure; 
failure with the crowd, whose violence was aggravated a 
hundredfold, and utter failure as regards spiritual power in 
proclaiming the Gospel. And what did God do, through 
my father and mother, who fifty years ago started their work 
on the Whitechapel Road? In thirty years, love in the 
hearts of William and Catherine Booth had kindled a flame 
in the breasts of triumphant thousands who, to the ends of 
the earth, carried the Gospel of hope into the darkest places 
of this globe. 

When a few years ago I followed my father to his grave; 
saw the streets of London cleared and gravelled for his 
hearse; walked behind the vehicle crowded with floral trib- 
utes from Crowned Heads and Republican Presidents of 
Europe and America; when I marched in the rear of that 
casket through eight miles of streets packed with sympathetic 
and appreciative people, my mind traveled back to other 
days and other crowds, in the streets and squares of England, 
where events, I believe, of even greater interest to heaven 
had taken place. I remembered how I had marched with 
my father when he had been hooted and stoned by angry 


92 IHE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


mobs, and I asked myself how this great change had come 
about? ‘There could be only one answer. It was not by 
worldly influence, wealth, or material force of any kind. It 
was LOVE—love for those most lost—which had made it 
all possible. 

What has been true of movements has been equally true 
of individuals. As an example of thousands, take the case 
of Livingstone, who faced the perils of Central Africa with 
the incentive of love in his heart and nothing but the Gospel 
as his defense. Only once was he assailed. Stanley went 
after him armed with steel and trusting in powder, and 
his progress was marked by pools of human blood. 


Jesus versus Cesar 


And now consider the nations whose glory and defense has 
been the sword? ‘They took the sword and they perished 
with it. Their chosen weapon for overcoming the powers 
around them became the weapon before which they them- 
selves succumbed. Where is Babylon? Buried beneath the 
desert sands. Where is Chaldea? All we hear of her today 
we read from her excavated tablets and age-worn statues. 
What of all the might of Egypt is left to look upon save her 
crumbling pyramids and her inexplicable sphinxes? What 
remains of the Grecian Empire? Everything she gained, 
even by her Spartan heroes, is lost; only her peaceful arts 
endure. The Roman Empire, notwithstanding her conquer- 
ing legions, is divided among the kings of Europe; she is 
remembered only by the laws she bequeathed. Where are 
the great generals with their big battalions, whose threats 
filled the earth with terror, whose fury stained it with blood ? 
Whose soul is refreshed, whose spirit inspired by the memory 
of Charlemagne, Charles V, Philip II, Peter the Great, 
Frederick of Prussia or Napoleon? I know all about the 
glamour we throw around the brow of the “conquering 
hero,” but it isn’t the spirit of the war giant, leading millions 
to the grave, which we invoke to help us pray. It is the 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 93 


spirit of Him “who when He was reviled reviled not again.” 
It’s not the bestial might of a Napoleon but the meekness 
of Christ which makes us strong. “Thy gentleness hath 
made me great.’ 

On the other hand, there are facts, even in the history of 
nations, which indicate the success of Christ’s policy for 
overcoming evil by moral suasion rather than by war 
For seventy years the State of Pennsylvania—settled and 
governed by the Quakers—refused to resort to arms of any 
kind, even for defense. What was the result? Let me tell 
you. While the adjacent states were having constant fric- 
tion with the surrounding natives, the followers of William 
Penn had established such a reputation for justice and good- 
will, that there was never a difficulty with these races which 
could not be amicably settled. Only when the sword was 
introduced did their real trouble with the natives begin. 

In Tasmania the British Government, after fruitless 
slaughter, had dispaired of quieting or conquering the savage 
natives whose remorseless fury had ravaged that Colony. 
The whole island had been combed by bayonets. ‘Then 
George Augustus Robinson, now revered by all, was_al- 
lowed, with only faith and love for his weapons, to enter 
the forests and face the black peril. ‘Frequently,’ he wrote, 
“have I seen the sun go down without any expectation of 
beholding it again as I have been surrounded by savage 
blacks with their spears presented. Yet I have been spared.” 
He walked four thousand miles over the wildest parts of 
the island and without shedding one drop of blood brought 
into an abode of peace every one of those wild desperadoes 
who had held the Colony in terror. 


The True Bond of Empire 


Consider the present condition of affairs as regards the 
United States and Canada. Here you have two powerful 
and exceedingly independent nations. One boasting its 


1Ps, 18:35. 


94 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


freedom from ties which once bound it to the Old Land; 
the other, with an enthusiastic loyalty, glorying in those very 
connections. Both are in keen competition with each other, 
both have had grievances of a more or less serious order to 
lay to each other’s account. Yet, here are two mighty peo- 
ples with sense and courage enough to put the principles of 
Christ, at least, to a national test. What is the result? 
You may travel over a border line of four thousand miles 
between Canada and the United States, and find never a 
fortress, a block-house, a gunboat or a cannon. No two 
nations ever lived together in greater harmony, no adventure 
would be so absurd, with either of them, as war between 
Uncle Sam and his best of neighbors on the other side of 
his northerly fence. But once let the United States go in 
for big armies, and her trouble will very soon begin right 
there! 7 

What is it, pray, that holds the great British Empire to- 
gether? It isn’t force. It isn’t armed legions and dread- 
naughts. John Bull once tried to unite his scattered family 
by fear, but one of his best sons, George Washington, for- 
ever convinced him that there was no way to success up 
that street. He learned his lesson well and, so far as his 
remaining dominions are concerned, he has practiced it with 


amazing results. For what is the force which today keeps | 


these far-flung, strong-headed, full-blooded young nations 
under the folds of the Union Jack? It is LOVE for the 
Mother Land. I have witnessed that love all over Canada, 
throughout Australia, New Zealand and the most important 


parts of South Africa. ‘Take that sentiment away, and the - 


governments which in the recent perilous times dispatched 
a million of their sons to fight for England on a foreign 
field would disclaim their allegiance and declare their inde- 
pendence tomorrow. 

I stand here, then, and, without fear of contradiction, I 
challenge the jingo, drum-beating, war-mongers of the world 
with this assertion. I say that if you place on one side the 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 95 


achievements, for the uplift and progress of humanity, ac- 
complished by Christ’s method of loving your enemies, and 
on the other side the things wrought by bludgeons, swords, 
spears, guns, you will find that the balance is overwhelmingly 
on the side of the policy of LOVE. Jesus was right and 
Cesar was wrong. 


“Bull Moose” Christians 


“But,” you say, “am I not then to defend my country and 
fight for my home?” Of course you are to defend your 
country and fight for your home. That is never in question, 
the question for you as a CHRISTIAN is HOW you are 
to defend and to fight. And the reply to this depends upon 
whether as regards war you are a truely awakened Christian 
or only an unenlightened one. If you are a follower of Christ 
you are to depend upon His method of defense and His kind 
of fighting. You are to fight fear with faith, hate with love, 
wrong with forgiveness, force with patient non-retaliation. 
To the “modern” Christian such defense is an exceedingly 
fanciful if not farcical kind of business. That is because 
the “modern” Christian’s religion is such a very grotesque 
and chimerical affair. The idea of really trusting the 
Almighty to send us the needed help for a perplexing dilem- 
ma, is One quite foreign to a frozen professor who knows 
nothing of the preciousness of Christ as Saviour and De- 
liverer from sin. 

It is fine, of course, to emboss on our dollar pieces the 
sign “In God we trust,” but to dream of trusting Jehovah 
under such conditions as would afford Him a square oppor- 
tunity of doing for us what we rely on our soldiers and guns 
to accomplish, such a procedure would, in the estimation of 
“big-stick” saints, be the perfection of absurdity. Their 
doctrine is, “Fear God and punch the other fellow,” whereas 
the doctrine of Christ was, “Love your enemies and trust in 
the Lord.” If it were not so tragic, it would. be laughable 
to hear the talk of preachers of a certain kind, when it comes 


96 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


to accomplishing anything by prayer and faith, anywhere but 
in their far distant, hazy, imaginary, spiritual sphere. The 
idea that the Lord could work any real wonders in or on 
His own material earth is, with them, anything but a cer- 
tainty. They reverently concede His competency to defeat 
whole legions of Devils, and then shiver at the thought of 
trusting Him for deliverance from a single regiment of 
British Guards or German Uhlans. “By all means,” they 
say, “have faith in the Lord to save you from the ‘rulers of 
darkness,’ but by no manner of means must you rely on Him 
to save you from King George or the Kaiser.” Hence we 
are exhorted to resort to persevering prayer as the best 
methods for dealing with the Devil, whom we cannot see, 
while liddite, dynamite and poison gas are recommended for 
his agents who visibly attack us. 

A striking illustration, though a perfectly logical result, 
of this glaring inconsistency, has been recently afforded us 
by a preacher, generally spoken of as the most “popular” 
evangelist of our time. Following the bad example of Ger- 
man war-pastors, he recently preached, apparently with abso- 
lute sincerity, a sermon on “the changeless Christ.” After 
thrilling thousands by a narrative of deeds wrought by the 
superhuman power, the matchless mercy, the forgiving love 
of our Lord, he then proceeded, when referring to the 
enemies of the United States, to cry out in prayer, before 
the same audience, to the same Saviour as follows: “Lord! 
I don’t pray for them—the sooner we damn them the better. 
Gosh! We've got to use bullets now, Lord. Bring us vic- 
tory.” 

But the Christ who said to His Church, “Love your ene- 
mies’—‘“Pray for them that despitefully use you”—‘Do 
good to them that hate you” is still “the changeless Christ.”” 
He told His followers to overcome the wrongs of the world 
by dispensing blessings, not “bullets.” ; 

The Burglar-Wife-and-Daughter Argument 
From different parts of the world I have received letters 


: 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 97 


concerning this war question, from ministers—some of them 
quite eminent men—and I have been impressed with the 
use so many of them make of what I call “The burglar- 
wife-and-daughter argument.” It begins with an “if” and, 
speaking to you as Christians, I suggest that you should be 
most guarded in relying on arguments which begin with an 
unbelieving supposition. “IF,” they say, “a robber came to 
my house and threatened to insult my wife and daughter, 
or to steal my goods, do you mean to tell me that I am to 
stand still and watch him do it without resisting him?” 

My reply is this. First you are to ask yourself this ques- 
tion: ‘‘Who is all the time my greatest protector?’ Upon 
whom is it that I depend daily for my deliverance from a 
thousand dangers—threatened by “the rulers of darkness” — 
by far greater than any robber could ever bring to my home? 
Who holds in check the annihilating forces in nature and of 
disease which, but for His intervention, would long since 
have sent me and my loved ones to the grave? By whose per- 
mission is it that I live? By whose permission does the rob- 
ber live? Who compounds the gases in the air so that they are 
exactly adjusted to my lungs; who supports the earth beneath 
my feet? ‘These are excellent themes for pulpit orations or 
Sunday School classes, but preachers who really believe that 
God keeps the sun and the stars in their courses and that, 
by withholding His hand from His children for a moment, 
He could sniff them out; who cry in the pulpit, “I will both 
lay me down in peace and sleep; for thou, Lord, only makest 
me dwell in safety,” such preachers ought not to be so dead- 
scared dependent on a six-shooter when a robber comes 
around! It is a strange thing to see a nation so ridiculing 
the idea of trusting God for protection when it is already 
dependent upon Him for existence. He is the God of the 
clouds and of the harvests. ‘“The horse is prepared against 
the day of battle, but safety is with the Lord.’ 

Again I would say to these burglar-intimidated ones, if 


"Pea, 4:8.. *Proy: 21, 31. 


= 


98 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


you are really such an advocate of Old Testament justifica- 
tion of force, why don’t you also support its advocacy of 
trust and forbearance? ‘The heroes of the Old Testament 
were not all Joshuas and Samsons, with dripping swords 
and reeking jaw-bones. Joseph, Daniel, the Three Hebrew 
Children, are also there. Don’t you think that the Lord, 
Who delivered Daniel from the lions’ jaws; and Shadrach, 
Meshach, and Abednego from Nebuchadnezzar’s furnace, 
might just possibly be able to save you from the paralyzing 
fear of that awful burglar? 


Refuge by Ruin 

Again, it is a poor way to protect your wife and daughter 
by launching out in a campaign to ruin other people's wives 
and daughters. Supposing some blackguard were to come 
from some near-by city and insult your children and rob your 
goods, would you gather your friends together, arm them 
with rifles, swords, bombs, and open fire on the citizens of 
that place indiscriminately, burning down other people’s 
houses and spreading sorrow and death among families who 
had nothing at all to do with the burglar other than they 
happened to live in the same city as he did? ‘This is exactly 
what you do, through your national army, when you give it 
your sanction for going to war with another people because 
a few of your fellow-citizens have been killed, some losses 
are threatened for your country’s commerce, or some injury 
has been done to its “honor.” 

Yet, again, I will remind you that your home is part ‘of 
an institution which was ordained by God, for which He 
made you personally responsible, while the nations of the 
earth today are controlled by the Devil. Moreover, your 
home is under a judicial system of government, also ordained 
of God, under which, if you lack sufficient faith in Him, you 
may appeal to the protection of the police, while war, as we 
shall see later, is subject to no such system. 

Further, I would say you are to commit your home, wife, 
your daughters, your goods, to the protection of God before 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 99 


the robber comes and to rest in the assurance that since 
“there shall no evil befall thee neither shall any plague come 
nigh thy dwelling,’’? that the robber will not approach your 
home, unless he be permitted to do so by your heavenly 
Father; that his coming under your influence may mean, 
for him, salvation and for you a blessing in disguise. ‘Then 
if the robber comes you are to treat him as instructed by your 
Master—with prayer, meekness, forbearance and love, re- 
membering that “it is enough for the disciple that he be as 
his master, and the servant as his lord’? and that He was 
robbed, insulted, assaulted, murdered, for your sake. You 
are to consider that it is a far more serious matter for you to 
kill the robber than it would be for him to kill you because, 
when you kill him you send him ¢o hell, but when he kills 
you he sends you to heaven, and he remains where his deed 
is likely to come home to his conscience, affording him an 
opportunity for repentance and faith in Christ, and therefore 
a chance to meet you there. 


What Would the Women Say? 


Still further I answer this specious argument by asking a 
question. I want to know what the wife and daughters, 
upon whose assumed timidity and defenselessness you build 
your theory, have to say about it. My knowledge of Chris- 
tian women convinces me that, in the display of genuine 
courage, willingness to suffer for a righteous cause, they are 
not one whit behind—they are often much ahead—of their 
boasted protector, man. I shall be very much surprised if 
this wife and those daughters of yours would wish you to 
commit murder in their defense. I question if they would 
have you go to God with the old excuse, ‘““The woman whom 
thou gavest, she made me do it.” “They would probably fare 
better if you got out of the way with your God-dishonoring 
rage and your six-shooter and left them to defend them- 
selves by the disarming influence of prayer, trust in God, 
and the grace of meekness. And once more I would say that 


1Psa. gt:10. *Matt. 10:25. 


~ 


100 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


you would be far more likely to protect your loved ones by 
throwing up your hands in prayer and letting them take your 
goods than you would by seizing the sword and the pistol 
for, if you are a true Christian, you would be a poor match 
for the robber in the use of arms, while he would be an 
expert at shooting—it is part of his business. 

Finally one more question—were you ever in a “hold up” 
onatrain? Did you fight the robbers then? 

The first Christians who were in Jerusalem when the 
armies of ‘Titus approached for her destruction were in ex- 
actly the position cited by these gentlemen. ‘Their city was 
being invaded by a cruel enemy, they were about to be robbed 
of their homes, their loved ones were threatened with shame 
and death; but Christ expressly told them they were not to 
fight. He said, ‘“When ye shall see Jerusalem compassed 
with armies . . . then let them which are in Judea flee.”? 


Salvation Through Suffering 


To hear some Christians talk, one would think that the 
protection of their relatives and the preservation of their 
property were the matters of supremest importance. But 
that is not the teaching of God’s Word. ‘The Bible tells us 
that the gains or losses of the Lord’s people in this age are 
less than nothing compared with the blessings they are to 
experience in the coming age of Christ’s reign in this world.? 

Has it not occurred to you, friends, that God may be able 
to do greater things for His kingdom, and far more for your 
own ultimate happiness, by the destruction of your home, the 
loss of your loved ones, than He could achieve by allowing 
you to possess them? ‘There is a sense in which every man 
risks his property when he invests it. Losing it rather than 
disobey God and go back on the principles of Christ IS 
investing it. It is most surely laying up treasure in heaven, 
“Whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.’ 
It will reproduce itself a hundred-fold on this earth in the 
Kingdom of God, which is so nearly “at hand,” God will 


1Luke a1:20, 21. 7Rom. 8:18. ®Matt. 16:25. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 101 


give you back your loved ones with an immeasurably in- 
creased affection if you trust Him to take care of them 
rather than seek to protect them by the breach of His law 
of love. ‘“‘And every one that hath forsaken houses, or 
brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or chil- 
dren, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundred- 
fold and shall inherit everlasting life.’ 

It sounds a hard doctrine, but the practice of it by the 
faithful in the early days of Christianity laid the foundations 
for the Church. Don’t we sing lustilly about the “noble 
army of martyrs’? Don’t we say that the blood they shed 
was the seed of the Church? Is it not one of the glories of 
our religion that they suffered patiently, unresistingly, even 
to death, rather than betray their Lord or disobey His com- 
mands in this very matter of fighting? Are we, then, to 
admire and extol them while refusing to follow their ex- 
ample? Don’t we know that had they resisted, had they 
resorted to swords and spears, had they taken revenge into 
their hands, organized battles against their persecutors, they 
would have been trampled under the iron heel of Cesar into 
obscurity before the Gospel would have had a chance to 
achieve its victories? 


The Promises Mature When the King Comes 


Nor is it unreasonable to suppose that, in these times of 
the approaching end of the age, there will be another call 
for the martyr-spirit and another opportunity for its display 
before an unbelieving world! Who, forsooth, are we that 
we should refuse to die for the cause? What is death, any- 
way, to us, when its sting is removed, its victory gone? Per- 
haps God is looking for more of this ‘“martyr-seed” which, 
when sown in the hardened soil of an apostate Church—a 
godless age—will produce another crop of real saints, made 
ready for “the rapture” by the purifying flame of suffering. 
It may be that He will be able to do far more by our dying 
than by our ministry in life. It is an open question, the 


Matt. 19:29. 


“ 


102 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


answer to which we shall not get till we meet in Glory, 
whether God has not wrought as great accomplishments by 
those who have died for Him as He has by those who have 
lived for Him. “But,” you say, “that wasn’t, after all, much 
of a deliverance to be so ill-treated and lose their lives.” 
But do you not understand how the greatest ‘“deliverances” 
promised to God’s people lie beyond the little span of exist- 
ence this side the grave? ‘The promised blessings are real- 
ized most fully, most gloriously, when the spirit passes to 
the life that is to come. The Christians of Paul’s time 
understood this. They seem to have suffered in this very 
thing, for the Apostle affectionately writing about them says: 
“For ye had compassion on me in my bonds and took joy- 
fully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that 
ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance.” 

I do not believe there is one of all the martyrs who is not 
conscious at this moment of every blessing resulting from his 
or her devotion. I believe Paul, Peter, the Saints of old, 
are filled with unspeakable rejoicing as they see in this 
world the fruition of their faith, the consequence of their 
courage; and I believe also that in the millennial kingdom 
they will reap a harvest of power and glory which they will 
then see could never have been gained in their earthly fight 
by any other means than by their willingness to suffer in 
seeming defeat, or to die in apparent failure. When you 
study the promises always keep your eye on the “glory that 
shall be revealed.” ‘The pledges of Jehovah, so far as they 
effect earthly prosperity, do not fully mature till He is in 
the place where He will be best able to discharge them as 
King of this world. In the meantime what we, as true 
followers of His, have to do, is to see to it that we carry out 
His behests, that we may boldly say, “The Lord is my 
helper and I will not fear what man shall do unto me,”? and 
to take courage in the thought “that all things work to- 
gether for good to them that love God.’ 


*Heb. 10:34. *Heb. 13:6. *Rom. 8:28. 


PART II 


WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
ANTI-JUDICIAL 


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WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
ANTI-JUDICIAL 


WHEN in the Garden of Eden our first parents had dis- 
obeyed God’s command, when sin had entered the world 
and the Devil had seized the scepter of earthly dominion, 
God mercifully overruled that disaster, not only by prom- 
ising to provide a sacrifice for sin, but by intervening to pre- 
vent the forces of evil from developing into anarchy and 
chaos. So, in order that His eternal purposes for the world’s 
redemption might not be frustrated, He ordained that Satan, 
while allowed to rule until his final overthrow, should never- 
theless control the world according to fixed principles of 
order and government. ‘To use an illustration, it was as if 
the owner of a railroad had said to its manager, ‘‘Since you 
have seized the System you are permitted to operate it, but 
you must run the trains on tracks which I have laid and 
from which I will make it overwhelmingly disastrous for 
you to deviate.” Hence, from the earliest ages of earth’s 
history, the principle of authority, order, government, is in 
evidence. 

It is of vital importance to a right understanding of the 
nature of war that we should get this fact firmly rooted in 
our minds. Order, authority, government, are in themselves 
of God. “There is no power but of God. ‘The powers 
that be are ordained of God.’ I am not speaking of any par- 
ticular kind of government, of good government or bad 
government; of government rightly administered or wrongly 
administered, I am speaking of the principle of government 
itself. I am referring to that instinct of order which prompts 
men for their own benefit, quite apart from their relation- 
ship to right or wrong, to set up a seat or center of authority 
in their midst. To appoint leaders, be they savage chiefs of 


7Rom, 13:1. 
105 


106 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


tribes, leaders in racial conflicts, generals of modern armies, 
judges of courts, kings of monarchies or presidents of repub- 
lics. ‘This principle of orderliness does not come from the 
Devil. It is, in fact, the very opposite of what the Devil 
would have. It originates in God. 


Order versus Anarchy 

If you can imagine what the world would be without any 
such principle; what it would become if every man was left 
to follow the bent of his own evil nature, unhindered by 
restraining influences; if each was allowed to gratify as he 
would his own fiery passions, to pursue, without regard for 
others, his schemes for self-aggrandizement; if all were to 
be law-makers, judges for themselves—then you will know 
something of what this world would be without constituted 
authority. ‘The worst of governments is better than no 
government at all. 

But, as regards this matter, God has arranged something 
more, He has placed in the breasts of all men, not only this 
instinct for government, but He has bestowed on them the 
gift of conscience by which they are able to distinguish be- 
tween right and wrong, to acquiesce in what is good, to dis- 
approve what is bad. ‘The lowest-down blackguard knows 
that honesty, truth, justice, are better than thieving, lying, 
or unfairness. However much of a cheat a man may be 
himself, he looks for an honest servant. “The most aban- 
doned criminal prefers, in the first place, an ordered society 
to a lawless mob; in the second place, he would rather have 
a righteous government than a government by scoundrels. 
Hence, we see how this prompting of consciences—this in- 
stinct for good government—has resulted in the creation of 
a judicial system, now a feature of all civilized nations. This 
is according to the purpose of a benevolent God, Who wills — 
not that men should perish, but that all should have the 
fullest opportunity of knowing and accepting His Gospel. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 107 


Through all ages also and for the sake of His own people, 
that they might have the best possible opportunity for spread- 
ing His truth throughout the world, this principle has been 
guarded, 


The Christian and Government 


This is why we are so ardently exhorted to ‘“‘be in sub- 
jection to rulers and authorities,” and we are reminded that 
“Whosoever resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of 
God.”? The “power” may be democratic or autocratic; it 
may be of our own nation or what we call a “foreign nation,” 
but if it is the constituted authority of that nation, we as 
Christians are to support it, for it is a manifestation of that 
principle of organization which God has decreed. It is in 
this sense that God says, ““By me’’—that is, by this principle 
which I have ordained, “kings reign and princes decree 
justice. By me princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges 
of the earth.”* ‘This does not mean, of course, that God 
identifies Himself with, or approves of, the abuses men often 
make of this power, it means the “power” itself. It is 
worthy of careful note that the Revised Version marginal 
readings of the passage in Romans thirteenth, refer to this 
“power” as something quite impersonal. ‘They read, “It 
is a minister’ —“Jt beareth not the sword in vain” —“The 
power.” ‘This principle, then, is not to be resisted. 

What the Christian’s individual relations to these powers 
should be, other than his obligation to support them, I am 
not speaking of here. Whether or not he is to turn to them 
for protection or to appeal to them when he suffers wrong, 
is not the question before us. “The matter we are consider- 
ing is his obligation to defend this governmental system as he 
finds it in the world today and to oppose, with all his might, 
any policy, whether it be of individuals or nations, which is 
not based upon it. I am going to show you that this is one of 


Siat.eest.  *Rom. 43:2. *Prov. 8:15. 


108 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


the strongest arguments for the Christian against all partici- 
pation in war. 

Let us look for a moment a little more closely into this 
system of government as God has permitted it to develop in 
our time. 

Essentials of Civil Government 


First of all, then, we find there is a constituted authority 
whose duty it is to make laws for the right ordering of 
society, for the guidance of the state and its individual citi- 
zens. What the character of that authority may be is, I say 
again, of no matter to the argument. It may be the arbitrary 
rule of an emperor, the reign of a king-in-council, the direc- 
tion of a president, a parliament, or a congress, it makes no 
difference. ‘The important fact is the existence of a properly 
constituted authority for making and amending law. ‘This 
is an all-essential feature of what St. Paul calls the “powers 
that be” as they exist today and as they existed in his time. 

Then there is a code of laws, brought thus into existence, 
and accepted generally as binding upon the citizens who are 
subject to the authority in question. It may be good law, 
it may be bad law. As a matter of fact it is, on the whole, 
good law founded on the Ten Commandments, but that is 
neither here nor there, the truth to be remembered is that — 
the law itself is a recognized thing. No honest person ever 
thinks of disputing it or attempting to set it aside even when 
it happens to clash with his own interests, or when he 
would have anything to gain by so doing. Everybody, not 
excluding criminals, admit their obligation to that code of 
law; everybody knows that to oppose or ignore it involves 
punishment which, although it may not always be just, 
is nevertheless necessary; hence they submit to it. 


Officialism and Legal Restraint 
The next fact to be noted about the God-ordained govern- 
mental system, or “the powers that be,” as they exist today, is_ 
the organization of an “executive” whose duty it is to see that 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 109 


laws are carried into effect, to bring to trial those who break 
them, and to put into execution punishments determined 
upon for their violation. But there is a very important 
limitation to the powers of this ‘“‘executive’ which I want 
you to carefully notice. Whatever names or name those 
officials constituting that “executive”. may go by—be he a 
bailiff, a sheriff, a policeman, a hangman, or be they a posse 
of mounted and armed men—they have all, while in per- 
formance of their duties, to act within limits of carefully 
defined laws. They are not left with unlimited power to 
use their authority at the dictate of their own sweet wills. 
They cannot, because they are officers of law, act illegally. 
They are to use no force or restraint which is not absolutely 
essential. If they strike you, they are liable to be called in 
question themselves before the courts for unnecessary assault. 
If they touch you, you can make them take you, and you can 
thus force them to prove their charges, or lay themselves open 
to counter-indictment for unlawful arrest. Many a spite- 
ful authority has found himself in the same place with Paul’s 
persecutors. These men discovered it was easier to fling him 
into prison than to get him out again. Paul, knowing this, 
refused to extricate his traducers from the dilemma into 
which their illegal treatment of him had brought them; ‘“‘But 
Paul said unto them, they have beaten us openly, uncon- 
demned, being Romans, and have cast us into prison; and 
now do they thrust us out privily? nay verily; but let them 
come themselves and fetch us out.’””* 

We see, then, how careful law-makers have been to pro- 
tect citizens from the overbearing masterfulness of bom- 
bastic officialism. Outside the ‘“‘sanctions of law,’ jack- 
boots, spurs, helmets, swords, are no more potent than eve- 
ning shoes, buckles, top hats and walkingsticks. No officer, 
either of the Crown or the Republic, can arrest any one 
without laying a definite charge or taking out a warrant. 
In the most highly civilized countries, even in serious dis- 


1Acts 16:37. 


— 


110 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


turbances, the riot act must be publicly read before arms can 
be used. I want you to keep well before you the fact that 
this “executive,” whose powers are best defined by the duties 
of policemen, is part of the political system which we are 
told to respect and uphold. It is the only kind of force, 
outside the confines of the Jewish nation, or acting strictly 
in connection with that nation, which the Bible has ever 
sanctioned. 
Trial Before Judgment 


Again I want you very carefully to notice another feature 
of the “powers that be” and which are “ordained of God.” 
This is the principle of trial before judgment, the verdict of 
a properly constituted court of inquiry before punishment. 
We find evidences of this principle away back in the earliest 
ages of the world’s history. It is based on the eternal attrib- 
utes of the Creator Himself. ‘Justice and judgment are 
the habitation of Thy throne.” We read also that “Moses 
chose able men out of all Israel and made them heads over 
the people, rulers of thousands, rulers of hundreds, rulers of 
fifties and rulers of tens. And they judged the people at all 
seasons; the hard causes they brought unto Moses, but every 
small matter they judged themselves.”* We see in these 
early days of Israel—whose national constitution, mind, was 
for all time God’s pattern for the nations—how urgently 
the government was enjoined to administer rewards or penal- 
ties only in strictest conformity with the decisions of these 
judges. She was never to act without them; “And thou 
shalt do according to the sentence, which they of that place 
which the Lord shall choose shall show thee; and thou shalt 
observe to do according to all they inform thee; according to 
the sentence of the law which they shall teach thee, and 
according to the judgment which they shall tell thee, thou 
shalt do: thou shalt not decline from the sentence which they 
shall show thee, to the right hand, or to the left.’ 


tPsa. 89:14. *%Ex. 18: 25, 26. "Deut. 17: 11, 12, 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD III 


Any system, then, in this dispensation, which inflicts pun- 
ishment on the accused before they are properly tried by a 
tribunal qualified to afford an impartial hearing, and pro- 
nounce a just sentence, is obnoxious to God. ‘That de- 
fendants, before a verdict is given against them, should have 
opportunity for proper defense concerning those things 
whereof they are charged, is His arrangement. Hence, we 
find in every civilized country a Department of Justice and 
Law. We see this principle still further developed and ac- 
centuated when—as in the matter of criminal offenses, which 
involves men’s personal liberties, or life itself—there is trial 
by jury. 

Now ‘et us look at what constitutes a competent court of 
justice. Let us examine the procedure which we have all 
come to feel is proper and essential in order that righteous 
decisions may be arrived at concerning the thousand and one 
contentions brought to trial every day between our fellow- 
citizens. 

What Constitutes a Court 


Such a court must then, in the first place, be presided over 
by competent judges. ‘These men must be qualified for the 
office they hold. ‘They must know the system of law they 
administer, as they must be practiced in the art of applying 
it to particular cases. “They must be, as far as possible, ex- 
perts in making allowances for what might be termed those 
extravagances of anger which render men unreasonable, and 
for that excitement, bred of fear or greed, which prejudices 
the arguments of those appearing before them. ‘This is why 
judges are appointed from the ranks of those who have 
already had long experience in the profession of the bar. 
They have learned the ways of witnesses and the tricks of 
lawyers. 

Again, such a court must be presided over by impartial 
judges. Anything of the nature of bias in a judge, for or 
against those appearing before him, would disqualify him at 

See Deut. 16:18. "See Deut. 16:19. 


s 


112 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


once as an adjudicator in a hall of justice. Whatever else 
he is, or is not, there must be no suspicion of his partiality. 
He must have no personal interest in the one whose case he 
tries. There must not be so much as a remote understanding 
which would make him lean towards either of the attorneys 
to whose pleading he listens. For a judge to be prejudiced 
through fear of powerful influences, or because of the “pull” 


of personal gain, would, in the minds of all true citizens, 


disqualify him for his office. I am not saying that such 
things do not sometimes happen, I am speaking of what are 
the universally required qualifications of a reliable adminis- 
tration of justice. No citizen would consent to be tried, if 
he could help it, by a judge who he knew could be bribed 
or bullied. It is this conviction which has created that 
“etiquette” in the British Courts which prompts a judge 
to at once withdraw from a case in which he discovers he 


has either directly or indirectly any personal interest. It is — 


this also which makes it possible for plaintiff or defendant 
to appeal for what is called a “change of venue,” if he can 
show there is ground for fearing that a judge will be preju- 
diced against him, or if the community surrounding the 
place where he is to be tried is so antagonistic, as to be likely 
to influence the court in his disfavor. 


The Witness and the Advocate 
Once more a properly constituted court must be a place 


where witnesses for both sides are heard.’ As, along history, 


God’s principle of equity has been practiced it has come to 
be more and more recognized, that the testimony of wit- 
nesses is of greater value to the cause of justice than the 
eloquence or argumentative ability of pleaders. It is not 
what lawyers say but what they can prove which tells in a 
court of law. It isn’t what theorists think but what wit- 
nesses know which constitutes the ground for decisions. 
Many a brilliant advocate has lost his case because the other 


1See Numbers, 35:30. Deut. 17: 6, 19: 15. 


tl ee ee 














THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 113 


fellow, though by no means such an artist at employing the 
“gift of the gab,” could nevertheless “deliver the goods’ on 
the witness stand. But note, these witnesses must be heard 
on both sides. To adjudge a case on the testimony of evi- 
dence submitted on the side of the plaintiff, without calling 
witnesses subpoenaed by the defendant, would turn any 
judicial inquiry into a mockery. 

Remember also that all these witnesses must be put on 
oath, or affirmation, so that what they say is under the 
restraint of serious responsibility. ‘Telling lies on the wit- 
ness stand is no joke. It means perjury and may involve im- 
prisonment. Again, witnesses are to say only what they snow. 
Their angry feelings, their prejudiced opinions, go for less 
than nothing. ‘They are also confined to the case before the 
court. They’re not allowed to impart a whole lot of facts and 
theories which might prejudice the jury against their op- 
ponent while they may have no real bearing on the question 
at issue. And last, but most important of all, they are to be 
cross-examined. All the skill of the opposing advocate is to 
be brought to bear on the things they say, so that their 
reliability may be put to the proof and their testimony may 
be tested by the laws of evidence. 

Let us briefly review these requisitions of modern justice. 
There must be a recognized authority for making law. 
There must be a legal code with penalties for its breach, 
accepted by all concerned. ‘There must be a properly author- 
ized executive acting strictly within certain legal bounds, to 
enforce the law and to punish those who break it. There 
must be a permanent court, where every case in dispute is 
brought to trial, whose decisions are accepted as final. There 
must be an exact execution of that court’s decrees; neither 
more nor less of punishment or reward being administered 
than the verdict of that court calls for. Presiding over 
that court there must be judges, properly qualified by learn- 
ing and experience. ‘They must be strictly impartial, in no 

1See Deut. 19: 16-19. Matt. 19:18. 


114 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


way prejudiced in favor of either of the litigants, not sub- 
ject to high influence, and with no personal interests to 
serve. ‘There must be witnesses appearing for both sides 
alike, sworn to speak the truth, forbidden to impart any 
evidence foreign to the case, and tested by cross-examination. 


International Lawlessness 


These, I say, are the qualifications imperatively demanded 
by the judicial system of our time. Without them any 
penalties laid upon any one, by any kind of government, 
would be considered a flagrant injustice. ‘They are the safe- 
guards men have come to realize are essential wherever force 
is resorted to. 

But has it, my friends, never occurred to you that war— 
that most disastrous penalty ever imposed upon the human 
race—is declared without the slightest regard to any of these 
essential principles of safety and equity? ‘To begin with, 
there is 2o international authority to draft and pass laws for 
the nations. ‘True, there is an elegant palace in Holland, 
built with the millions of a mam whose hope for the world’s 
redemption would seem to have been centered more in the 
wealth extracted from the Bethlehem Munition Trust in 
Pennsylvania, than it was in the “riches of grace” first mani- 
fested toward the world in the Bethlehem stable in Palestine. 
But that palace has no constitutional authority back of it. 
That palace has been a gilded toy of nations, where they have 
deceived each other with plausible words at The Hague, 
while building dreadnaughts and piling up armaments at 
home. While, without doubt, it has served a good purpose 
in settling minor differences, not convenient for governments 
to fight about, yet, under the first real test of national self- 
interest we have seen that palace vanish like a castle in 
the air. There is no super-government. 

No International Law 


As to international law. There is none. ‘There never is 
when war looms above the horizon. Every nation inyolved 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 115 


in the great war, tore it to ribbons. While national character 
and the craze for “patriotism” remain what they are, there 
can be no reliable international law. From the beginning, 
the world’s history has been one long record of broken 
pledges whenever one empire has found it possible to eat 
up another. As yet the only prevailing law between nations 
has been the law of self-interest. The law of getting, regard- 
less of what is right, their own ends by the merciless process 
of might. Men tell us—they have been saying so for quite 
a long time—that society will ultimately get this interna- 
tional law and this court of nations established. It is very 
likely that the outcome of the recent world strife may lead 
to some such “federation of powers,” and that thereby 
there may be created later on the place and the opportunity 
for the Anti-Christ to assert himself. But such a universal 
dominion will not mean the peace of the world. On the con- 
trary, Jesus told us it will be the introduction of that “great 
tribulation” such as the world has never known. Nor will it 
do away with wars, for Jesus also told us that there shall be 
“wars and rumors of wars” to the end, and that this age 
should close with the greatest clash of arms in all history, 
the battle of Armageddon. He taught that the true, perma- 
nent, universal law would come only when His kingdom 
came, and that His kingdom would never come till He came 
back to establish it. 


No International Judges 


And just as there is no international law, so there is no 
international judge or set of judges. Each nation is not 
only a law unto itself, but constitutes its own tribunal and 
judges its own cause. These judges are just everything that 
the stipulations of a civil court demand they should not be. 
They are incompetent for the simple reason that there is no 
standard of international doctrine or international law to 
which they can apply their minds. One cannot become 
proficient in a system of jurisprudence which does not exist. 


116 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


One cannot graduate as a jurist in a college which has no 
science of law to teach. As we have just seen, international 
law is a misnomer. When, therefore, this momentous ques- 
tion of war has to be considered; when the justice or in- 
justice of it has to be carefully discussed, there are no well- 
recognized judicial balances in which to weigh the “pros” 
over against the “cons.” ‘There are no generally accepted 
legal standards by which to measure the arguments of the 
jingos. ‘That twisty wriggling procedure called “diplomacy” 
takes the place of the civil judge’s well-ordered and properly 
regulated adjudication. | 

Nor are these arbitrators who decide for or against war in 
any sense impartial. They are, in fact, the very opposite 
of impartiality, for they are themselves either the plaintiffs 
or the defendants in the causes which they take it upon 
themselves to decide. They are even more, for they are the 
prime movers in those national policies or political intrigues 
which, during the years preceding the world’s wars, have 
surely led up to their outbreak. “The men, therefore, who 
decide for war are almost always the very men who make 
it possible. Could any judges be more unsuited, by reason 
of antecedent acts or preconceived ideas and prejudices, for 
so serious a deliberation as that which may involve the plung- 
ing of a whole nation into blood ? 

Neither can it for a moment be said that these war-court 
judges are free from the “‘pull” of powerful influences. They 
are the prime movers in party politics. They are influenced 
by exaggerating and sensational newspapers, as also by 
the excitement always engendered by their dangerous and 
wicked appeal to a brutish, fighting instinct. They are in- 
fluenced by the lure of popularity, the opportunity to pose as 
the patriotic defenders of their nations; and, frequently, 
alas! less worthy influences than these are present to assert 
their powerful sway. There are even rich and influential 
men, supporters of parties and controllers of votes; men 
whose fortunes are made or whose millions augmented, not 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 117 


only by the supply of food and ammunition for the armies, 
but by the increase of prices and the manipulation of stocks 
and bonds—these men are always on hand to get in their 
“pull,” nor do they scruple to exert their power to the utmost 
limit. 
Blood-Money Trusts 

I do not believe we have any idea of the extent to which 
politicians are influenced, either consciously or unconsciously, 
by cliques of wealthy men who have “axes to grind” at the 
national millstone. I hold in my hand a pamphlet entitled, 
“The War Trust Exposed,” by J. IT. Newbold, M.A. It 
is published in England, and I have seen it quoted, as a 
reliable booklet, by authors of repute. “The facts it discloses 
concerning the munition makers of Britain are enough to 
stagger mankind. It exposes a net-work of firms which 
work hand and glove with each other. ‘These firms have 
ramifications—in quite a number of instances, they have 
branch establishments—which extend to alien countries. 
Thus Englishmen who boast their “patriotism” have for 
long years been raking in fabulous profits by ships, guns and 
shells supplied to foreign governments; ships, guns and shells, 
mind you, which they knew were more likely one day to be 
used against their “beloved country” than in her defense. 

As only one example, take the case of Italy. Most of the 
dreadnaughts and guns of the Italian navy have been built 
by branch concerns of British firms established in Italy, or 
by munition factories which, since the vast majority of their 
shares are in possession of British ‘‘patriots,” are entirely 
controlled by them. And yet these “‘patriots’’ knew perfectly 
well that every ounce of ammunition supplied to Italy was 
an aid to the then existing ‘“Iriple Alliance” which they 
never ceased to tell us England would, one day, have to 
fight. No Christian wishing to keep a white soul concern- 
ing this matter of war ought to rest till he has, by hook or 
by crook, gotten hold of that booklet and studied its damn- 
ing facts under the blaze of God’s eye. I am sorry to have 


118 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


to say it exposes a strange and startling community of legis- 
lators, high officials, titled gentlemen, admirals, generals, 
divines of the Established Church and leading noncon- 
formists who have joined together in unholy co-operation to 
make money by the shedding of human blood. 


And mark, this business is not confined to Italy. ‘These 
stockholders in this wholesale human butchery have so ar- 
ranged matters that their profits accrue whenever or wher- 
ever there is war. It matters little where armies march out 
to kill each other, or where dreadnaughts and submarines 
move through the sea, the diabolical weapons forged in their 
foundries, the powder and shot made in their factories, will, 
by doing their deadly work, easily bring the coveted but 
blood-stained dividends. 

So we see that the judges who decide for war are the very 
men who have often their own or their kindred’s personal 
ends to gain, and who are always surrounded by those whose 
principles and policies are shaped by the consideration of 
their pocketbooks. What a burlesque such a judge would 
be in a civil court! Such a tribunal as that, I take it, is not, 
as regards this matter of war, one of “‘the powers that be” 
which was ever “ordained of God” or which when it con- 
cerns killing his brother man the Christian is under any 
obligation to obey. 


The Sanctions and Limitations of Law 

As for the “executive,” appointed by these governments, 
to carry into effect their declarations of war, the antithesis 
is startling, the contradiction complete. Everything is ex- 
actly reversed. ‘The policeman, or, as his name really im- 
plies, the “peace-man,” is, so far as his avocation is concerned, 
distant from the soldier as the poles are apart. Immediately 
war is declared soldiers march out to do not only almost 
everything forbidden to policemen, but they have the sanc- 
tion of their officers for breaking, so far as the “enemy” is 
concerned, just about every law the magistrates in their own 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 119 


countries are sworn to uphold. On the battle-fields they get 
medals for deeds, which if done at home would result in 
their imprisonment. 


What, then, are the practices of the soldier and what the 
duties of the policeman? I want you to give particular at- 
tention to this comparison because the advocates of war are 
constantly telling us that, when the Apostle Paul wrote in 
support of the magistrate, “Who beareth not the sword in 
vain,” he vindicated the use of arms as we see them employed 
today in the settlement of national disputes. Assuming that 
the word “sword,” as it is used here, implies a real weapon 
rather than a figure of speech—an emblem of the magis- 
trate’s authority—I will say that to build up an arugment 
on this text and a few others in the thirteenth of Romans, 
betrays a somewhat superficial study of the Scriptures. A 
little thought will suffice to show that the sword in the 
hand of the magistrate and the sword in the hand of the 
war-lord, are by no means the same thing. 

As we have seen, force exercised under sanctions of recog- 
nized law, with limitations imposed by that law, is the very 
opposite to force behind which there is no such judicial au- 
thority or control. In one case the use of force is of God, 
in the other it is of the Devil. In one case killing is capital 
punishment, in the other it is murder. War is a sudden 
revolution of the accepted jurisdicture of civilized society— 
a jurisdicture resulting from the experience of centuries and 
which has the confirmation of the Bible. War ruthlessly 
tears down the standards of righteousness and truth. One 
well-worn excuse for its iniquity is the saying, “All is fair 
in war.” In dealing with the enemy, honor, honesty, in- 
tegrity, justice, are flung to the winds. Soldiers are con- 
trolled by nothing and no one but the will of their generals, 
and generals have one sole object—to win the victory. How 
they achieve their victories, whether by means honest or dis- 
honest, is a matter to them of supreme indifference, 


120 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


The Policeman and the Soldier 


And so we find the soldier acting constantly in exactly 
the reverse order to the policeman. ‘The policeman is the 
servant of civil law subject to its restrictions; the soldier is 
the servant of national interest, national pride and national 
vengeance. The policeman stands for the security of life 
and property ; the soldier trespasses on the enemy’s lands, bom- 
bards his cities, seizes his homes, steals his belongings. The 
policeman discourages or prohibits the use. of all arms, ex- 
cept in cases of urgent necessity for preservation of peace, 
and only then with severest restraints and in ever decreas- 
ing quantity; the soldier employs, to the utmost, the cruel- 
est, most destructive, death-dealing instruments which scien- 
tific genius can create, and always in increasing amount. 
The policeman guarantees immunity from danger of vio- 
lence; the soldier takes the terror of fury and slaughter 
wherever he goes. The policeman insures the protection of 
the family, of women, children, the aged and the feeble; 
soldiers, for the most part, have always been associated with 
wrecked homes, the violation of womanhood, an appalling 
death-rate among the young, and a quick extermination of 
the feeble. Among other reasons, the policeman is on the 
streets for the prevention of cruelty to animals; the profes- 
sion of the soldier necessitates inconceivably horrible suffer- 
ing on the part of helpless dumb creatures. The policeman 
represents the principle of equity, settlement of disputes by 
impartial tribunals; the soldier appeals to the arbitrament of 


the sword, exalts the brute force of dragoon government, — 
and acts on the preposterous theory that might is right. The 


policeman stands for the sacred prerogatives of the individ- 
ual, for liberty of conscience, freedom of speech, the power 
of the press; but as soon as the soldier comes on the scene 
there is a suspension of individual liberty, personal rights 
are subordinated to political interests, free speech is forbidden 
and the power of the press is destroyed by a lying censor- 
ship which distorts news, and prevents healthy criticism. 


CO 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 121 


Along the beat of the policeman one sees wealth, health, pros- 
perity, opportunity, and the prospect of better things to 
come; along the trail of the soldier one sees poverty, misery, 
despair, disease, destruction and death. ‘The profession of 
the policeman is to prevent and punish crime; the soldier’s 
demoralizing butchery encourages every villainy out of Hell, 
it justifies murder by applauding and rewarding the “‘valor” 
which slaughters the other fellow. Policemen extend a 
helping hand to the unfortunate, they represent municipali- 
ties which make provision for the homeless and the starving; 
soldiers go about poisoning wells, cutting off supplies of 
cities and starving the inhabitants of whole nations. Police- 
men never fight each other, even national barriers do not 
prevent them working in co-operation; soldiers are trained 
to fight other soldiers. ‘The policeman operates within his 
nation by an authority ordained of God; the soldier operates 
outside his nation in an international sphere controlled by no 
constituted authority and eternally disturbed by greedy diplo- 
mats whose grasping policies are responsible for nearly all 
the battles he goes to fight. Lastly, the policeman stands for 
good will toward all, and malice toward none, while the 
soldier fights by the spur of passion or fear, and leaves be- 
hind him a legacy of hatred for future generations.’ 

What indeed, then, has the Christian to do with the pro- 
fession of the soldier? Could any system be further from 
that “ordained power” of God which he is told to support? 
Could any calling be more in keeping with the evil princi- 
palities and powers he is commanded to oppose? 


Scandalous Injustice 


To continue our comparison between the essentials of a 
civil court of justice and the tribunal which decides for war, 
I want you to notice further, that there is a scandalous dis- 
proportion between the punishment inflicted upon an oppos- 

1For some of these contrasts between the policeman and the soldier I 


am indebted to a booklet entitled “Judge, Policeman and Soldier,” by 
Joseph Edmundson. 


Me 


122 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


ing nation, and the offense with which it is charged. Nowa- 
days, in a civil court it would be deemed preposterous bar- 
barism to pronounce the sentence of death upon a prisoner 
for trespassing on a rich man’s preserves, stealing a neigh- 
bor’s goods, or insulting some member of a lordly estate. 
But that is exactly what War-Lords do when they declare 
war against another power. Nine out of every ten of the 
wars, which have sent hundreds of thousands to the grave, 
were waged for reasons which could never justify a national 
death sentence. Either “national honor,” which, ninety- 
nine times out of a hundred is another word for national 
pride, has been insulted, or “national rights” have been in- 
vaded, or perhaps some distant frontier has been violated. 
Possibly the reason was some stupid offense against an 
obscure citizen, or because somebody had stuck up a flag- 
pole and claimed possession where some other nation con- 
sidered it had “influence” or “‘special interests,” as in the 
case of the ‘‘Fashoda Incident,”’ which only a few years ago, 
brought England to the verge of war with France. 

Mind, I don’t say these are the real reasons, but these are 
the most plausible excuses which the war-makers of the 
world can invent. ‘They have no better justification to 
offer. At the most such trespasses would, in a court of law, 
be atoned for by a few years’ incarceration. What kind of 
justice is it, then, which inflicts fire, blood and tears on a 
whole nation for such offenses as these? Is this the sword 
in the hand of the magistrate which Paul tells the Christian 
he is to revere? No self-respecting atheist, to say nothing 
of a child of God, enlightened with the mind of Christ, 
could for a moment uphold such a palpable misinterpreta- 
tion. The magistrate “who beareth not the sword in vain,” 
and whose authority is commended to our esteem, does not 
sit in his place to give decisions, reached by a process of 
adjudication which is in direct antagonism to the system of 
justice he is sworn to administer. He cannot command 
our allegiance if, while holding the office where it is required 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 123 


of him to judge men after the law, he condemns them not 
only contrary to that law, but contrary to the principle of 
judicial government. Paul knew something about that by 
his own personal experience.* And Jesus Himself was up 
against a power of that kind when He called Herod a 
“*fox.’’2 

False Witnesses 


Now let us look at the witnesses by whose testimony the 
war offices of the nations support their appalling verdicts. 
Who are they? Where are they? Strange to say, one hardly 
ever hears of them. There is, in fact, no properly ordered 
inquiry at which any reliable evidence could be taken. There 
is no witness stand, no administration of oath or affirmation. 
The facts are rehearsed by a few paid officials in the “diplo- 
matic service,” whose interests are all too frequently on the 
side of making a row, whose views are even more prejudiced 
than their governments at home. No attempt is mc \e to 
hear advocates and witnesses on behalf of both sides of the 
dispute. Indeed, such a procedure would be impossible 
under the present ridiculous method of international adju- 
dication. Until the nation is hopelessly committed, there is 
no attempt even to bring the matter before the representa- 
tives of the people. The public do not get to know the 
points at issue until it is too late. 


How, then, is the fatal verdict, fraught with such gigantic 
consequences for two great populations, arrived at and 
given? ‘The summing up is done by those whose ambitious 
pride renders it most difficult for them to consider fairly 
the rights of the other side. “The verdict is rendered by the 
very men whose policies have brought about the quarrel. 
That verdict is bolstered up by ex-farte statements made, 
without cross-examination, by their own witnesses. Nor is 
the decision pronounced in an impartial court where silence 
and dignity are preserved for the voice of justice. No, the 


Acts 23:3. 
2Luke 13:32. For the magisterial use of the sword, see pages 260 to 266, 


124 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


decree is delivered amid the clash of arms, the fanfare of 
trumpets, the singing of national anthems and a roaring 
tempest of blind, frenzied excitement, skilfully provoked 
by an expert war-whooping press. 

To put only one citizen to death, within the borders of 
any civilized nation, for a charge of murder, which was 
adjudicated upon by a farcical, iniquitous system of that kind, 
would be sufficient to overturn a government and to pro- 
voke an indictment for manslaughter against a minister of 
justice. Yet there are even ministers of the Gospel who will 
urge their young men to go out and slay thousands of their 
fellows, for a cause which has nothing better in the way 
of a judicial inquiry back of it than that I have described. 
Putting a man to death without proper trial is the foulest 
murder. It is just as much murder for a nation as it is for 
an individual, for the nation is made up of individuals, and 
God has not one law for man and another for communities 
of men. 

Who is to Judge? 

Do you ask me, “Who, then, is to be the judge between 
these nations and who is to say when they are justified in 
drawing the sword?” I reply God alone can be such a 
judge. But these nations are not godly nations. ‘They do 
not recognize His authority over their international policies. 
They do not even consult Him about them. The interests 
of His Church, His kingdom on earth, are not the concerns 
which lead to their differences and quarrelings, hence they 
have not, like the Jewish nation, the Almighty as the director 
of their pursuits and the instigator of their wars. Don’t 
you see, then, your peril as a Christian in going to slay your 
brother at their behest? 

Who but God can trace the subtle currents of national 
pride, national arrogance, and national aggrandizement to 
their sources and thus unravel the tangle of diplomacy, trick- 
ery and intrigue which, along the years, has marked the 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 125 


policies of nations in dealing with each other in the struggle 
for ascendancy throughout the world? 

Take, for instance, the recent war. Where is there a 
true Christian who dares say that he knew for a certainty 
that the cause of either of the nations he served was just? 
Each of those nations pleaded what it considered an “excel- 
lent case.”” When one had digested the contents of the “blue 
book,” the “yellow book,” the ‘“‘pink book,” the “green book,” 
the “white book,” issued by those governments their argu- 
ments resembled the hues of the spectrum which mingle and 
dissolve back again into one and the same ray of light, and 
one felt like saying of them: ‘Six of one and a half dozen 
of the other,” or, as we say in America, ‘‘fifty-fifty.”’ 

In Vienna, one heard of “the peril of Serbian intrigue;” 
in Petrograd the cry was, “the peril of Austrian tyranny ;” in 
Berlin they talked of little but “the peril of British navalism”’ 
and “the peril of French revenge;” in London the cry of 
alarm concerned the “peril of Prussian militarism’’—though 
one did not hear so much as before the war about “the peril 
of German competition ;” and in Paris it was always “‘the 
peril of German invasion.” According to their governments 
they were all fighting a just war, a war of defense against an 
ambitious and shameful aggression, and for a legitimate and 
desirable expansion of empire. It is also interesting to ob- 
serve how all the statesmen of these countries, while pre- 
paring vigorously for war on land or sea, were, as they for- 
ever must be, eloquently talking peace. 


b] 


Hypocritical Love for “Little Nations” 


’ 


Concerning “the integrity of small nations,” in the inter- 
ests of which more than one of the powers declared they went 
to war, it is no part of my business to judge any of 
them; I am not dealing with politics, but with Christian 
principles. But I would remind you that the servant of 
Christ cannot swallow all these protestations of national 
devotion to small and defenseless powers without at least 


126 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


a grain or two of salt. It is well to recollect that there are 
other names on the map of the world than Serbia and Bel- 
gium. Roumania, for instance, against her solemn protest 
was also violated when Russia, like Germany in Belgium, 
marched her armies through her neighbor’s territory to reach 
the Turks. None of the other nations protested then. It did 
not suit their purposes to do so! Something, too, of an en- 
lightening nature might be said about the Transvaal and 
the Orange Free State; about Persia, Morocco and Finland ; 
about Herzegovina, Greece, Ireland, and even Mexico! 
One might also speak of China, whose helplessness—far 
from making her the object of this heroic “protection”— 
has made her, under that very pretext, an easy prey for Eu- — 
ropean diplomatic plunderers. Nor must we forget how the — 
bodies and souls of millions of her people have been destroyed 
for money. As recently as 1905 22,000 tons of opium were 


sent into China by England! ‘There is a very recent his- ~ 


tory pertaining to all these countries which does not strik- 
ingly attest, on the part of the nations recently at war, a very 
unselfish disinterestedness in, or a particularly chivalric 
protection of, “brave little nations,’ when their own inter- 
ests do not demand it. 


Armenia and the Congo! 

As for the picturesque oratory with which the statesmen of 
London and Berlin have entertained us, concerning the 
urgent necessity for putting down “British imperialism” or — 
“Prussian autocracy,” it lost, with some of us, much of its © 
force because of the long unheeded cry from poor, down-trod- — 
den Macedonia to “come over and help.” All this talk in 
London and Berlin about the dangers to mankind which ~ 
lurked behind the English crown or the Kaiser’s scepter, — 
sounded ominously near the hypocritical when in the mouths 
of men who have fought for a generation, as England has 
done, or during the recent war, as Germany did, to keep, for 
their own selfish purposes, the sword in the hand of the — 








THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 127 


bloodthirsty Turk. Which of these nations had moved a 
dreadnaught or opened the breech of a gun in order to snatch 
“poor little Armenia” from the relentless grasp of the Otto- 
man assassin? ‘The smouldering ashes of burning and plun- 
dered cities brought no tears to the eyes of diplomats, whose 
gaze was fixed on Constantinople, and whose interests were 
all on the side of keeping the Dardanelles closed to battleships 
which might prove a menace to the Suez Canal. The death 
cry from hundreds of thousands of innocent and defenceless 
Christians fell upon ears which were already more impor- 
tantly concerned with the warnings of Indian nabobs and 
princely civil servants, whose territories and millions had to 
be safeguarded from the possible attack of Russia even if 
by the friendship of the abominable Sultan.* 

Tell me, which of the powers, who, during the war, 
trumpeted their disinterested championship of the weak, ever 
recruited a regiment to save the multitude of dark-skinned 
toilers who, in the rubber forests of the Congo, fell in 
pools of blood under the lash, or by the bullets, of 
merciless money-grabbers? ‘This cash went to the Royal 
House of Belgium and comprises a substantial part of the 
fortune of the present king of that country. ‘This is the 
king whose image has been on every newspaper in this land 
as the idolized hero of the allies, but his country, recently in 
the hands of the enemy, has been ravaged by fire and sword. 

God does not forget! 

Mind, I am not for a moment saying that the Church 
ought to have sanctioned war to fight these wrongs. As a 
Christian I don’t believe war, during this dispensation, is 
ever the right way to rectify evil. What I say is that we 
Christians have every cause to accept with extreme caution 
the reasons put forward by all the powers for the last great 
_ war, when they are so palpably off the square with their 
actions in the past. I do say, more positively still, that these 


*Since the Armistice was signed, Armenia, the Christian “little Nation” 
has been left to the mercy of the Turks, 


128 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


manifest inconsistencies show the Christian how impossible 
it is for him to find in the decrees of politicians justifiable 
cause for killing his fellow-man. 


Scraps of Paper 


But you say, “What about the treaties? Is it not the will 
of God that nations should keep their promises and fulfil 
their obligations to each other?” To which I answer, “It 
all depends on the nature of the treaties.” ‘There are some 
treaties a Christian has no right to consent to. A Christian 
has no authority from God to sanction any treaty for any 
kind of commercial advantage which involves the shedding of 
human blood. Incivil life a citizen, be he a Christian or other- 
wise, has no business to make a contract with another which 
stipulates that, unless certain things are done, he will com- 
mit murder. Such a contract would be an illegal transac- 
tion and to make it would be an indictable offense. Should 
such a treaty have been made for a Christian without his 
knowledge—a treaty which in some way made him a party to 
the slaying of his brother man—it would be his duty, in- 
stantly he became aware of it, to disavow it. I take my 
stand on the Bible and I say that there is no conceivable ad- 
vantage that could come, by any of the treaties, which any 
one of the ungodly nations around us have made with each 
other, that would warrant the breach of the Sixth Com- 
mandment by a follower of Jesus Christ. 

The treaties these Christless nations make with each other 
are solely for their own material welfare. ‘They concern 
territories, extension or maintenance of empires, markets, 
commerce and right-of-way over land and sea. ‘They are 
made to preserve certain dynasties, to safeguard certain sys- 
tems of earthly governments, to protect particular fortunes, 
to prevent partiality toward aggressive competitors, to check- 
mate the diplomacy of dangerous antagonists. But these are 
not causes for which Christians should kill. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 129 


Non-Christian Treaties No Warrant for Christian 
. Blood-shedding 

Frequently the ostensible reason for making a treaty— 
the reason given out to the public—is not the real cause for 
the contract. Sometimes it is quite the opposite. ‘Thus far, 
in most cases, this has been true as regards the treaties which 
big powers have made with “small nations.” ‘Though such 
“little nations” have been repeatedly made to think so, it 
has not been a commendable ambition to protect the weak 
which has, in the majority of instances, inspired these treaties. 
On the contrary, they were shrewd contrivances, devised by 
the big nations, for self protection by the creation of what 
are called “‘buffer states.” These “buffer” territories serve 
the purpose of “neutral zones” between the gigantic armies 
of the great powers; the instinct of self-preservation has 
made the populations of these “zones” impartial watchmen 
for any approach of danger, and their territory has offered 
a convenient area in which to fight out some of the bloodiest 
battles of all time. This is the reason why these much 
championed little countries, which are supposed to be under 
the protection of everybody, have so often become the cock- 
pits of Europe. 


But the Christian will surely see that all these treaties 
are not matters for which he ought to die—and do not for- 
get that to lay down your life for a cause not sanctioned by 
Christ is swicide—or in defense of which he ought to kill. 
They have nothing to do with the vital concerns of the 
Church of God. ‘Though they may incidently or indirectly 
seem to benefit the material progress of that church, they 
were in no sense instigated to aid the Kingdom of Christ. 
In God’s sight the whole lot of them put together are not 
worth the immortal soul of one little drummer-boy. As a 
Christian you had better lose every earthly advantage coming 
to you, by virtue of any kind of a treaty, than take such an 
advantage at the price of the blood of those for whom your 
Saviour died. That you are entitled, just because you are 


130 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


a Christian, to every righteous privilege this world can offer 
you, I shall show later on, but when you are asked to prove 
your worthiness of such privileges, by committing murder, 
you are to prefer to let them go rather than enjoy them on 
any such terms. 


They Are All Guilty 


Nor can you march off .with armed battalions to spread 
destruction and death, and vindicate your action by an appeal 
to the “honor” of statesmen, even though they talk about 
“the sacred obligations of treaties.” Make no mistake you'll 
be leaning on a broken reed if you rely on the resourceful 
artifices of modern statecraft for your standards of “honor.” 
There isn’t a nation existing which has not reckoned treaties 
as “scraps of paper” when it considered the “imperative re- 
quirements” of its best interests demanded that it should do 
so. Every power in the recent war tore to shreds the most 
solemn bonds, once signed and sealed with all the ratifica- 
tions of law and all the paraphernalia of state. Keeping 
within the period of that war, we see how Germany did 
it in Belgium; England did it on the high seas and in 
Greece; Italy did it when she broke loose from the Triple 
Alliance. Looking further back into quite recent his- 
tory we know how Russia went back on her solemn vow 
to Finland; how France by a shameful subterfuge broke her 
contract with Morocco, and how both England and Russia 
flung to the winds the most solemn obligations into which 
they had entered with Persia. To some of us, it would 
seem as if the Constitution of the United States itself had 
been violated under the pressure of the recent war.* 

Before you pin your faith to the integrity of Foreign Office 
diplomats, my Christian friend, it will be well for you to 


*Christians should remember all that was said by allied Statesmen during 
the late war and study carefully their astonishing contradictions concerning 
treaties since the armistice was signed. As this book goes to press Mr. Lloyd 
George cables American newspapers that “‘the League of Nations has abdi- 
cated” and, referring to Italy’s rejection of its jurisdiction and its powerless- 
ness to enforce obedience he exclaims ‘‘What is left of the Covenant of 
Versailles!” 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 131 


study carefully such works as Bertrand Russell’s ‘“‘Justice in 
War-time,” and Frank Bullard’s “Diplomacy of the Great 
War.” Read what they tell us, on the ablest authority, 
about the intrigues, secret treaties, lying tricks and diplo- 
matic double-dealing of the statesmen of Europe during the 
last half century, and you will see what has led up to the 
late war. You will also discover that all these nations 
keep waste-paper baskets—not excluding the astute agents 
of John Bull. If one could examine the contents of these 
repositories for the last hundred years one would find many 
torn-up “scraps of paper” which once bore the impress of 
very imposing constitutional seals. Berlin is not the only 
place on this planet where treaties have been reckoned as 
worth little more than the material on which they were 
written. It is shameful but it is true. 


Keep then ever before you that you are to oppose war as 
a Christian because it is anti-judicial. ‘The teaching and 
practice of the whole New Testament requires you to do 
so. When war-advocates argue that because St. Paul justifies 
the majesterial use of the sword for enforcing God-ordained 
law amongst the ungodly he therefore approves its use 
by the Church as a means of settling the disputes of nations, 
you must show them how the argument is exactly the reverse. 
You must show them that the very conditions under which 
the Apostle permits the employment of the sword—which 
are strictly judicial—constitute the strongest possible case 
for its prohibition to the Christian in war—which is both 
lawless and unconstitutional. You are to fight against the 
sword in the hand of the soldier for precisely the reason that 
Paul sanctions it in the hand of the magistrate. In one case 
its use is lawful compulsion to do right, in the other its em- 
ployment is lawless license to do wrong. 


The Christian and Law 
Before leaving this part of my subject I desire to add a 
few words about the Christian’s individual relationship to 


132 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


this political system which I have been showing is of God. 
First of all, then, there can, I think, be no doubt about his 
right, while he is engaged in the lawful pursuits of life, to its 
protection. Mind, I don’t say he should appeal to it, that is 
a matter of his faith, but I do say he is entitled to the general 
benefits of security it has brought to the community. Since 
the magistrate is a “minister of God” for the preservation 
of order and the suppression of lawlessness; since all kings 
and rulers are permitted by Him, for the express purpose of 
insuring such a condition of orderliness as will make it pos- 
sible for the Gospel to be proclaimed; Christians, above all 
others, are entitled to any benefits accruing from that orderli- 
ness. T’o say that because a Christian profits as regards either 
his home or his business by the existence of the police force, or 
because he pays his taxes, or casts his vote for the best avail- 
able government of his country—to say that on that account 
he gives his sanction to the use of the sword in the lawless 
wars of the world, is to confuse the legitimate blessings of 
civil government with the illegalities of anarchical strife. 
The Christian pays his taxes in support of “the power” 
ordained of God, not for the unlawful use men make of that 
power. If righteous law and order are of God, then no one 
is so entitled to the benefits that result from them as the 
Christian. 

On the other hand, for the follower of Christ to make use 
of this system of law in order to right his personal wrongs 
and to be avenged on those who do him injury is a totally 
different matter. 

Note well, however, that whenever the law can be ap- 
pealed to or used to defend, or extend, the interests of God's 
kingdom, and to prevent the suppression of the Gospel, the 
Christian is certainly entitled to its aid. He is, without 
doubt, justified in refusing to submit to illegal attempts to 
suppress the truth, or to destroy his opportunity for use- 
fulness as a servant of God. Under such conditions he has 
the warrant of Scripture for exhausting all constitutional 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 133 


methods to prevent such wrong. ‘The judicial system exists 
primarily by God, for God, and to aid in His work. It may 
be used just as lawfully as any other of God’s creations. 


Paul’s Appeal to Cesar 

Here is the reason why Paul appealed to Cesar. He acted 
out the principle of his epistle to the Romans and appealed 
to “the power” which Czsar represented, which “power” 
was a “minister of God for good,’ to him. He was using 
it for a “good” purpose. The Jews had handed him over 
to the Romans so that, in fact, he already “stood at Casar’s 
judgment seat.”? But when Festus suggested that he should 
take him back to Jerusalem, Paul, knowing that to take him 
back there was an illegal act, and that it would surely mean 
the suspension of his ministry before he had been given his 
coveted opportunity of preaching the Gospel in Rome, de- 
cided to avail himself of every privilege the law gave him as 
an aid to the completion of his witness for his Master. His 
passion to reach Rome and his conviction that it was God’s 
purpose to get him there, is surely evidenced in the first 
chapter of Romans, where he writes: “I long to see you” — 
“oftentimes I purposed to come unto you’—‘I am ready to 
preach the Gospel to you that are at Rome also.’” 

Hence he answered Felix: “If I have committed any- 
thing worthy of death I refuse not to die’—in other words, 


“T don’t resist the law’—‘But if there be none, of these 
things whereof these accuse me,” and since already “I stand 
at Casar’s judgment seat’”—‘‘no man may deliver me unto 


them. I appeal to Czsar.”? In other words, “I have been 
handed over to Czsar though I have done no wrong, I claim 
the rights and the protection which Cesar affords me, since 
they will enable me to preach Christ at Rome and before 
the imperial throne.” 


4Acts 25:10. *Rom. 1:11, 13, 15. *%Acts 25:9, 10, 11. 





PART III 


WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
IMMORAL 


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WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
IMMORAL 


As a Christian, you know, of course, that morality is one 
thing and Christianity is another, that there is an important 
distinction between them. Morality is not always associated 
with religion, because there are some religions which, in their 
ideals and practices, are exceedingly immoral. But it is 
possible to be an ideal man from the standpoint of morality, 
and yet know nothing of the saving power of Christ in the 
heart. It is true, therefore, that you may have certain kinds 
of religion without morality, and you can have morality 
without Christianity, but it is equally true that you cannot 
have Christianity without morality. Everything, therefore, 
that is immoral is essentially unchristian. 

War is immoral, therefore it is unchristian. 

Any system, any avocation, any amusement, any profes- 
sion, which invites or encourages or necessitates wrong-doing 
cannot be Christian. 

War does all this, therefore it is unchristian. 

Any agency, call it what you may—for whatever purpose 
It operates—which compels men and women to cross the 
barriers established by God, the conscience, the Bible, as the 
boundary lines between what is right and what is wrong, 
is immoral and is therefore unchristian. Any profession 
which obliterates the lines of demarcation between what is 
honorable and what is dishonorable; what is just and what is 
unjust; what is merciful and what is cruel; what is con- 
ducive to health and what is productive of disease; what is 
pure and what is impure; what is helpful to life and what 
is destructive of life, any pursuit that does all this is immoral, 
and must therefore be unchristian. 


137 


138 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


War does all these things, therefore war is immoral and 
unchristian. 

Any profession which throws a cloak of respectability 
over what is disreputable; which gives sanction to what, 
under the circumstances of well-ordered society, would be 
ostracized as contraventions of well-established law; which 
imparts an éclat of heroism to deeds which, when judged 
by the standards of justice, would be regarded as outrageous 
crimes; which offers rewards for accomplishments of a 
nature which would bring an ordinary citizen to judgment, 
to jail or to death—any profession of this kind is immoral 
in the highest and most dangerous degree. 

The profession of war does all this, therefore war is im- 
moral and unchristian. 

Let us see if we can prove it. 


I. IN THE FIRST PLACE, THEN, I CHARGE IT 
AGAINST WAR THAT ITS RULES AND 
STANDARDS LEGALIZE AND 
PROFESSIONALIZE EVIL 


The very standards of this system are destructive of high 
ideals. Hence it must demoralize and deteriorate any Chris- 
tian having anything to do with it. No profession can be 
better than its doctrines. It is in the truest sense what it 
teaches. Its ethics are its essence. “The truth about it is 
just what its tactics display. If it is a system of lies, it is a 
lying thing. If it is a vocation of refined deception, it is 
a deceitful thing. If it is a calling which teaches how to 
spread destruction most efficiently, it is a destructive thing. 
If it is a science which produces the cruelest and most irrisist- 
able instruments for smashing men’s bodies or taking their 
lives, then it is a cruel and murderous thing. 

Lies, deceit, destruction, cruelty, murder, these are not 
the standards of morality. 

How, then, can they be the standards of Christianity and 
how can a Christian enroll himself beneath them? 


A British Field Marshal on the Witness Stand 


Let us call one of the most respected and successful sol- 
diers of modern times to the witness stand and hear what 
he has to say about the standards of his profession. It is 
not necessary to listen to his voice, which is now silenced in 
death, because we have his words in writing. To have such 
documentary evidence is an advantage, as all lawyers will 
admit, because what is written cannot be wrested from its 
obvious meaning nor can it be refuted. Let us then read 
from one or two of the editions of a handy but vary crowded 
and comprehensive little book, called “The Soldier’s Pocket 

139 


140 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Book for Field Service,” by Field Marshal Viscount Wol- 
seley.t Viscount Wolseley was the soldier’s idol. His pocket 
book became the constant companion of all who desired to 
excel in the service. It ran through five editions, one of which 
was published in the United States at the time of the war 
with Cuba. Its statements have never been challenged, 
though they have been supplemented by others in books of 
the same kind which, as the ‘‘science” of war has “‘progressed” 
have appeared, and to some of which we shall refer. 


One of the first assertions which attracts our attention 
from the pen of this illustrious advocate of war, who, I be- 
lieve, was a much esteemed member of the Established 
Church of England, is on page 169 and reads as follows: 


“As a nation we are bred up to feel it a disgrace ever to suc- 
ceed by falsehood. The word spy conveys something as repulsive 
as slave; we will keep hammering along with the conviction that 
‘honesty is the best policy.’ These pretty little sentences do well 
for a child’s copybook, but the man who acts on them in war 
had better sheathe his sword forever.” 


It would be interesting to know what the Archbishop of 
Canterbury would have to say concerning this indictment of 
the way the British nation, to which his Church is so closely 
allied, has been “bred up.” He doubtless knows what his 
late famous fighting ‘“communicant”’ seemed all too ignorant 
of. He knows that honesty, in the breast of a true Chris- 
tain, is not a question of natural “breeding” at all, but a 
matter of being “born again’ of the Spirit. He knows that 
it would be as difficult for a really converted man to delib- 
erately lie and have no qualm of conscience as it would be 
for him to hold his naked eye to the blazing sun and feel 
no pain. But of course to have made such an admission to 
the “gallant general’? would have embroiled the worthy 
archbishop in awkward complications, because he would then 
have had to say to Viscount Wolseley what Viscount Wol- 
seley so bluntly says to the British soldier, what, in fact, 


1For a more comprehensive review of this Pocket Book, see pamphlet 


entitled “The Deviltry of War,” by John J. Wilson, Friends Peace m- 
mittee, 136 Bishopgate, London, Eng. 


J 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 141 


Christ Himself, in a suggestively similar phrase, once said 
to the first bishop of the Church. He would have had to 
say: “General, since the principles of honesty are vital to 
Christianity, and since you say, ‘the man who acts on them 
in war had better sheathe his sword forever,’ you cannot be 
a Christian and a soldier at the same time—‘put up the 
sword.’ ” 
Devilish Double Dealing 

So far, then, Viscount Wolseley’s testimony is most help- 

ful to our case. Let us continue the examination: 


“Spies are to be found in every class of society, and gold, that 
mighty lever of men, is powerful enough to unlock secrets that 
would otherwise remain unknown at the moment. An English 
general must make up his mind to obtain information as he can, 
leaving no stone unturned in order to do so.” 


The inference would seem to be that an English general is 
to use British gold without stint to bribe men to Jie and 
to deceive in order to get information about the enemy. But 
the most important piece of the Christian’s armor, that with- 
out which all other parts would be rendered useless, is “the 
girdle of truth.” It is quite evident, therefore, according to 
Viscount Wolseley, that this “armor of God” is no suitable 
equipment for the British soldier. But let us read on: 


“It is important that spies should be unknown to each other. 
Care should be taken to make each believe that he is the only one 
employed. Some serve for patriotism, others for money, some 
receive pay from both sides; if such a one can be depended upon 
he is invaluable.” 


Think of it! A double-dyed traitor actually taking pay 
from the enemy while posing as their agent, giving them false 
information and all the time using the confidence thus ob- 
tained to get facts for the use of his real masters in the oppos- 
ing camp! When a British field marshal waves his staff 
approvingly over the head of an expert deceiver of this kind 
and calls him “invaluable,” one feels justified in concluding 
that the profession which sets so high an estimate on the 
services of such a scoundrel must be a pretty low-down 
affair. Perhaps this esteemed military authority forgot those 


142 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


words of the Lord by the pen of the psalmist, “He that 
worketh deceit shall not dwell within my house: he that 
telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight.”* and, probably he 
overlooked one of the last solemn sayings of the Bible: “All 
liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire 
and brimstone.’” 

Professional Stealing 


It is instructive, also, to note what this great “Christian” 
commander-in-chief of the British army has to tell his offi- 
cers and soldiers about appropriating other people’s property. 
After an attempt to “save the situation” by approving the 
usual custom of army officials in paying for provisions he 
says: 

“When campaigning in an enemy’s country it should without 
doubt be put under requisitions of money.” 

And then concerning the method by which these moneys 
are to be gotten he goes on to say: 

“It is best to get them collected by the regular tax collectors.” 

This is very like saying: 1. Take what provisions you 
need and can’t pay for. 2. Pay for them if you can. 3. 
Steal the cash to do it with. 4. Compel those you are rob- 
bing to get you the money. A decided advance, surely, on 
anything yet conceived concerning the art of robbery, even in 
a thieves’ den! 

Following this we have careful instruction concerning how 
requisitions may be made on townsfolk or peasantry, for 
feeding soldiers—‘‘one ration daily for every three inhabit- 
ants;” how oil, boats, utensils, farming implements may be 
seized and be used against the country of their owners. 
Churches devoted to the worship of God and jails utilized 
for the punishment of crime are linked together in an amaz- 
ingly indiscriminating manner—as though one was no better 
than the other—when the storage of gunpowder, for which 
they are recommended, is the consideration. 

Viscount Wolseley tells us that when defenses are needed, 


1Psa. 10137. Rev. 21:8. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 143 


enemy-citizens should be compelled to do as much of the 
work as possible in order to “spare the soldiers,” and calmly 
proposes that if a town or city should resent such an in- 
famous compulsion for the service of the enemy of one’s 
homeland, ‘“‘a good way to bring it to reason is to cut off the 
supplies of provisions and water.’ In view of the howl 
which has gone up from the English Government against 
Germans for perpetrating exactly such an abomination in 
Belgium, one is enabled to see how, in the practice of war, 
one nation is not much better than another, after all. In- 
deed, how could they be, for war itself is essentially immoral. 
It is immoral because, on the showing of one of its ablest, 
most honored practitioners, it sanctions immoral acts. Out 
of the mouth of one of the greatest soldiers of modern times 
we judge it. Viscount Wolseley’s book is crowded with 
careful, minute instructions, urgent incentives to acts, which 
are against the laws of God and the acknowledged safe- 
guards of society. 


Systematized Lawlessness 


It is not the only book of the kind. There are others. 
Study them, as I have, and you will discover that these 
codes of military rule and procedure set their seal of approval 
to just about everything the civil law under which their 
authors were born and live, condemn as viciously immoral. 
They throw a gloss, which they call ‘“‘heroism,”’ over con- 
duct which, when judged by the Bible and at the bar of 
conscience, is cruel and villainous. Their pages are crowded 
with sickening and dehumanizing instructions. ‘They ex- 
plain the exact ranges, the precise elevation, the proper speed 
which, when shooting, will accomplish the most slaughter. 
“Aim low and shoot slow” is one of the dictums. They 
explain the bloody thrust of the bayonet, “‘first forward then 
upward.” “The points at which the attack should be di- 
rected,” they tell us, “are, in order of their importance, 
stomach, chest, head, neck and limbs.” “If the butt end of 


144 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


the rifle is employed, the points of importance are first, head, 
neck, stomach and crotch.” ‘They tell us the bayonet is best 
used with a “ringing cheer” and in the dark, where men 
cannot be unnerved, or their mercy appealed to by the pitiful 
anguish of those whose lungs or bowels are pierced. They 
show the best way to burn bridges, homes and villages along 
lines of retreat. They give careful advice even about dead- 
houses, urging that they should be “in a retired spot so that 
funerals can take place without attracting attention,” and 
the men left behind may not be too constantly reminded of 
the loss of their comrades. “They explain how to pursue a 
fleeing and panic-stricken foe so as to “hammer him with 
guns, charge him with cavalry; and keep pushing him and 
hitting him from morning until night” and they show how, 
if the flying enemy is “shattered” the troopers may find it 
safe to dismount and resort to “cold steel.” 

The supplementary instructions of those who use these 
manuals are like unto them. Sergeant Empey, in his book 
Over the Top, tells us how when in a bayonet charge the 
instructions given him for releasing a bayonet from a victim 
came to his memory. He says: 


“Then through my mind flashed the admonition of our bayonet 
instructor back in Blighty. He said, ‘Whenever you get in a 
charge and run your bayonet up to the hilt into a German, the 
Fritz will fall. Perhaps your rifle will be wrenched from your 
grasp. Do not waste time, if the bayonet is fouled in his equip- 
ment, by putting your foot on his stomach and tugging at the 
rifle to extricate the bayonet. Simply press the trigger and the 
bullet will free it?” 


Legalized Debauchery 


A writer in one of these manuals, when dealing with 
the matter of womanhood and the standard of the soldier’s 
honor in relation thereto, does not seem to experience any 
embrassassment nor to be troubled over much with a sense 
of modesty. His advice is short and to the point: “Abstain 
if you can,” he says, “if not, and blacker temptations may 
beset you—be moderate and scrupulously careful about 


~~ Ze 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 145 


cleanliness.” ‘This “Christian” warrior’s standard of “clean- 
liness,” whatever it may be, is certainly not according to the 
Scripture idea of a clean heart. Nor is his estimate of the 
soldier’s regard for the honor of woman one jot above that 
of the rowé of Piccadilly or Broadway, whose one concern is 
to satisfy his lust, quite regardless of the welfare of his vic- 
tim, but supremely “scrupulous” about avoiding the penalties 
which Almighty God has ordained should follow those who 
break His commandments. Has this professor in the art of 
militarism, who with such light-héartedness directs the feet 
of the soldiers to the house of the harlot, forgotten that Solo- 
mon tells us, “her house is the way to hell, going down to 
the chambers of death.’ 

All I can say is this. If you want to know how a dirty, 
sneaking, slimy, murderous, treacherous, lying, spying, merci- 
less set of practices can get themselves hidden away under 
the military glory which goes with the razzle-dazzle of 
plumed helmets, gold buttons and spurred heels, then read 
the instructions to soldiers and the “tactics of war” written 
by these “army experts.” They know what they talk about 
and their utterances tally to a micety with the expression of 
another great general when he said “war is hell!” It is 
more than hell, it is everything that is hellish. It is victory 
by villainy. Mind I do not dispute that the governments of 
ungodly nations have a right to resort to it. Since they 
reject the Gospel and teachings of Jesus, it is only logical 
they should do so; but the Christian does not employ hellish 
methods for getting people into heaven. 


4Prov. 7:27: 


Il. IN THE SECOND PLACE, WAR IS IMMORAL 
BECAUSE ITS WEAPONS ARE DECEITFUL 
AND CRUEL 


There is a relationship between certain tools and men 
of certain character. ‘There are peculiar instruments which 
go with particular occupations. If you stumble on a bag of 
jimmies, skeleton keys, devices for opening windows and 
blasting safes, you may be pretty sure you are on the track 
of a burglar. Some “outfits” are highly indicative of out- 
laws. Certain kinds of retorts and condensors evidence an 
illicit still. There are dies and crucibles which go with 
forgery and false coin. Laboratories of a certain nature 
point to lawlessness and anarchy. Even the house of seduc-. 
tion and the brothel have their appurtenances. ‘The char- 
acter of all these diabolical professions is reflected in the 
nature of the machinery they employ. 

This also is true as regards war. 

It is also, one may say, increasingly the truth as what is 
termed ‘‘the science of war’’ progresses. 

Consider for a few moments one or two of its instruments, 
Their wonderful mechanism evidences an almost demoniacal 
ingenuity for carnage and catastrophe. Look at the bayonet, 
that weapon which is ever linked with the highest type of 
the soldier’s courage. Its point is deadly, its edge surely sharp 
enough. But have you noticed the groove that runs along 
the blade? Do you know what that is for? ‘That is to 
enable the air to pass into the wound, so that the disablement 
of the victim may be the more certain. A nice weapon, that, 
for a Christian! 


Diabolical Ingenuity 


Did you ever examine a whitehead torpedo? Have you 
noticed its chamber of compressed air for propelling power; 


146 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 147 


its tiny engines to carry it to its objective; its gyroscopic steer- 
ing contrivance by which it is kept in its deadly aim; its 
propellers, head, detonator and two hundred and twenty 
pounds of high explosive—here is an instrument which de- 
notes in every part of it devastation and death. I tell you, 
the automatically erecting jaws, the perforated fangs, the 
poison-sacs of the viper are no surer evidences of the Devil’s 
work, than is the accursed contrivance of that torpedo! Only 
satanic agents could employ such a tool against their fellow- 
man. 

Take a Springfield, a Mauser, an Enfield rifle and ex- 
amine them. Especially the cartridges, which, as instru- 
ments of assault and murder, are placed in clips of six or 
twelve at a time in their magazines. Could anything be 
more horrible? Our much boasted science has multiplied 
by fifty the soldier’s means for destroying life and limb. 
Every cartridge, as every hand grenade and bomb, bears 
upon its face the marks of murderous intent. ‘The brains 
that designed and caused their construction were, when 
they did so, thinking out the most efficient way to shatter 
human bodies. Every rifle when given without proper 
judicial sanction to a soldier is a warrant for wilful murder. 
Along its sight the eye takes its deliberate aim and by its 
trigger the will performs its sanguinary act. In the grasp 
of a Christian for the execution of worldly wars, it is a 
murderer’s tool, and the true saint can no more carry it in one 
hand and the Word of God in the other than he can carry 
hell-fire and the joy of heaven together in his breast. 

Think of the shells, the ghastly effects of which are 
“written up” with all the relish for the glory of battle 
characteristic of a war-crazed press. Could the genius of 
the bottomless abyss crowd more of ruin and death into 
the same space than the military scientists have packed within 
the steel case of a twelve-inch explosive?) Do you know 
about these shells? They are so wonderfully constructed, 
so exactly adjusted, so perfectly obedient to their dispatcher’s 


148 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


wishes, that they will go the precise distance intended, ex- 
plode at the particular spot and elevation desired, spread 
their death-shower of lacerating metal over the heads of 
marching men, or burst at their feet with an annihilating 
concussion as directed. “They will do all the work of a 
dastardly army of assassins without the heart or conscience 
of an assassin to appeal to, aye, without an assassin’s soul 
to bring to account. This is a satanic art of murder by 
machinery. | 

Yes! These rifles, bayonets, torpedoes, machine-guns— 
like all other bloody accounterments of war, take their places 
with the sharp teeth of dogs, wolves, bears, lions; with the 
fangs of reptiles and serpents; the poison glands of taran- 
tulas and scorpions; the stings of wasps and hornets; they 
may be classed with the claws of lions and tigers while 
some of them may be likened to the stinking gas or the nasty | 
fluid emitted from the pole-cat and the scuttle-fish. All 
these malignant appliances for offense and defense are the 
results of sin, which has made man and beast alike, when 
driven by appetite or greed to seek their prey, or protect their 
belongings, both savage and merciless. They are the works of 
the Devil, all of them, for they will all disappear in the 
millennial reign of Christ. Mind, I don’t say that in the 
present condition of the world the earth powers around us 
will cease to use these weapons. We are distinctly told they 
will not. They are the best defenses which, “in the vanity 
of their mind” and “through the ignorance that is in them”? 
they can devise. But I do say, and my statement is supported 
by every tenet of the Christian faith as well as by the Word 
of God, that no follower of Christ can, for the purpose of 
killing his brother man in war, even dream of touching 
such arms. As regards those who resort to these weapons, 
the Christian will join in the prophetic utterance of the dying 
Jacob and say, “Instruments of cruelty are in their habita- 
tions, O my soul, come not thou into their secret.” 


1Eph. 4:17, 18. *Gen. 49:5, 6, 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 149 


Out of Sight Out of Mind 


There is another important fact to be noted about the 
weapons of modern warfare. Not only do they become more 
cruel as new inventions are sought out, but the more “im- 
proved” they are—the more awful their slaughter becomes— 
the more have they the effect of removing those restraints 
which ought to be felt by those who use them. ‘The em- 
ployers of such tools ought to see the immediate results of 
their actions. But this is becoming less and less the case, 
because modern arms enormously widen the area between 
armies which attack each other. Apart from bayonet charges, 
which generally take place in the dark, it is, in most cases, 
impossible for a soldier to know really what he is doing. 
There is less and less for his conscience to bring home to 
him. 

When the life of Joseph was trembling in the balance 
Judah, addressing his murderous brethren, spoke more signifi- 
cant words than perhaps he knew when he said, “What 
profit is it if we slay our brother, and conceal his blood?’”* 
God has ordained that to conceal the blood of a murdered 
man should be difficult, and that is why most murderers 
are trapped by the blood-stains of their victims. Hence, the 
first concern of assassins is to keep clear of the blood of 
those they slay. On this account it is “profitable” for a 
soldier, when prompted by the passion of battle to kill his 
brother, that he should understand beforehand that he will 
have to see the red blood flow from his veins, for that knowl- 
edge might, at the last moment, prevent him doing the deed. 
As in the case of Lady Macbeth, the sight of blood leaves a 
mark on the mind. But modern instruments of war enable 
their users to evade this. With a simple bow or arrow, as 
used in ancient times, the aggressor had to advance to where 
he could see his arrow pierce the flesh of his foe; today, with 
his magazine rifle he stands in a ditch or crouches behind a 
rock and fires twenty bullets a minute at a range of two 

1Gen. 37:26. 


150 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


thousand yards. He never knows the souls he dispatches or 
the misery he spreads till his account is squared before the 
throne of God. With the old battering ram or even the 
less clumsy cannon of Napoleon, the operators or gunners 
were face to face with the horror of their doings; but to- 
day a twelve-inch shell, whose terrible explosion will blow 


the limbs off a score of men, or bury a whole company under 


the ruins of a fortress, can be placed, with the utmost sang 
froid, in the breach of some cunningly hidden steel monster, 
and sent to its destination eight miles away, with a result of 
which those who fired it hear nothing save a voice by wire- 
less from some aeroplane a mile above, saying, “A bull’s eye,’ 
or indicating a more accurate range. Instruments which 
enable their employers in this way to spread damage, death, 
misery and tears, without the restraint which comes by 
knowing the effects of their actions, must indeed be the in- 
ventions of the Devil, for they so effectually silence the voice 
of conscience in the soldier. “They enable him to do the worst 
of wrongs without feeling the pricks of remorse. 


Murder without Remorse 
If the commanders of German Zeppelins or the captains 
of British aeroplanes—who have still some tender considera- 
tion for home and little ones—could see through the dark 
depths, just as they are about to release the missle of horror, 


if they could know of the sleeping mothers and children who, » 


without a moment’s warning, they were sending into eter- 
nity; it would not be, I think, without a qualm of conscience 
that they would let fall the bolt of doom. But they don’t 
know. ‘They’re too far off to see. ‘They justify their act 
by the supposition that some camp or fortress lies beneath 
them, and so the deed of horror is done, while they sail away 
to receive their rewards as brave men! It is thus that, under 
the cloak of war, the Devil succeeds in enabling men to break 
the most binding laws of God without remorse; to slaughter 
their brother man without hearing the voice of their brother’s 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 151 


blood crying from the ground. Each nation when at war 
will make frantic efforts to manufacture thousands of aero- 
planes from which “young gentlemen” may drop bombs out 
of the clouds upon women and children without knowing 
what they do! 

But it may be answered: ‘“The utilizers of these modern 
implements witness the horror of their effectiveness within 
their own lines and batteries. Are they not also the sufferers 
by similar weapons used against them?” ‘To a certain extent 
this is true, but in this case the carnage rather increases than 
restricts the butchery, for those who fall around the guns 
fall, in the estimation of their comrades, as heroes not as 
man-slayers. ‘They perish, not as the victims they have killed 
in the gun-pits of the foe, whose spirits have gone to the 
great Bar of Justice to charge them with having been the 
instruments of their destruction; they fall rather as coura- 
geous “defenders of their country.” ‘The wounded who drop 
while serving the guns are tenderly carried to hospitals and 
extolled for their “bravery.” ‘Those left in the rifle-pits 
or batteries are incensed rather than subdued by the death 
scenes around them. ‘They go on serving the guns with a 
zest inflamed by a desire to avenge the death of their smit- 
ten comrades. 


Ill. THE IMMORALITY OF WAR IS PROVEN, 
NOT ONLY BY THE NATURE OF ITS 
INSTRUMENTS BUT BY THE 
ACTUAL USES MADE OF 
THEM, ALIKE, BY ALL 
THE WARRING 
NATIONS 


History shows that war has become ever increasingly de- 
ceitful. It is less and less a matter of open conflict; more 
and more a pursuit characterized by sneaking lawlessness 


and stabbing in the back. The much-abused gladiator of. 


ancient Rome was a gentleman compared with the modern 
soldier, for as the military art “progresses,” those who 
follow it approach ever nearer to the habits of the wolf, the 
fox, the snake. The strategy and the tactics aspired to today 
are the strategy and tactics of treachery. But treachery is 
the very opposite of Christianity. 


Hide-Peep-and-Shoot Warfare 


This “strategy” shows us some strange things. We see 
artillery and machine-guns skilfully masked behind inoffen- 
sive hedgerows or wreathed with the blossoms of hawthorn 
or lilac. One perceives the deadly mouths of pom-poms 
peeping through standing stoops of ripened wheat; the 
gaping jaws of huge mortars sunk in holes covered with 
grass-sods, or obscured by the density of luxuriant forest 
and undergrowth. In place of battalions moving swiftly 
into the fire-zone, or maneuvering to threaten flank and rear 
of the enemies’ positions; instead of regiments of prancing 
cavalry charging the foe at the climax of battle; there are 
almost limitless lines of men, stalled in endless miles of 


152 


on ~~ 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 153 


“ditches,” “warrens,” “dug-outs,”’ with carefully concealed 
“communication passages,” all of which are equipped with 
periscopes and other devices for seeing without being seen, 
and perforated with slits and peep-holes for the barrels of 
rifles or machine-guns, so that men can shoot without being 
shot at. Thus, “The dark places of the earth are full of 
the habitations of cruelty.” Day after day, month in and 
month out, the armies in the summer swelter amid flies or 
battle with fever, and in the winter, swirl in mud and suc- 
cumb by thousands to tuberculosis and rheumatism. 

Occasionally this ground-hog kind of warfare is terrorized 
by an appalling and hellish rain of a million shells, which, 
falling on a portion of the trenches, pulverize their defenses. 
Hundreds of shrieking men are buried like rats in holes, 
after which frenzied and furious attackers rush madly across 
the spaces which separate the contending armies and fall by 
thousands. All this in order to take a few miles of territory 
and occupy a few more holes, which are not infrequently 
very soon retaken. Invariably the whole situation settles 
down again for another prolonged period of hide-and-seek, 
peep-and-shoot, kind of warfare. It would probably be no 
exaggeration to say that in killed, wounded and prisoners, 
reckoning both sides, it costs half a million or more men 
to take five miles of territory. 

Is this the way a Christian can best fight for his country? 
Is it in a skulking, cringing manner like this he is to carry on 
the warfare for his God? 


Sneaks of the Air and the Sea 


Again, consider those still more “advanced” and very 
much more glorified methods of modern warfare for fighting 
in the air. ‘True, one hears of air-battles in the open, when 
men come out and face each other with courage and skill, 
but how often is this aerial warfare a record of dirigibles and 
aeroplanes creeping to great heights, under cover of dark- 


1Psa. 74:20. 


154 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


ness, or rushing into obscuring clouds, or covering their 
whereabouts by emitting black gases, by means of which they 
are able to swoop down unseen and strike fatal blows with- 
out giving their enemies “‘a fighting chance.” Why, a good 
sportsman would spurn to treat a jack-rabbit that way! 
Think of dropping bombs on sleeping cities like a thief in 
the dark! All the warring nations have done it, or have 
feverishly prepared to do it. But make no mistake, a Chris- 
tian can’t do it. He doesn’t drop bombs out of the heavens 
to destroy; he sends prayers into heaven which bring down 
unseen powers to save and inspire. J 

Yet, again, consider that still more detestable manifesta- 
tion of the deceitful methods of modern war—the submarine. 
The U-boat is the much trumpeted triumph of naval archi- 
tecture. If it were possible to convert the Devil’s high art of 
duplicity into mechanism, surely the submarine affords us 
the most perfect example of that transformation. ‘To use a 
figure, one may call it a mechanical incarnation of the Father 
of Lies—the Devil, who was “a murderer from the begin- 
ning,” the representation in steel of a beast rising up out 
of the sea. 

Think of it, stealing along there in the bowels of the deep, 
armed with all but supernatural powers to defy the forces 
of destruction, which on every side, above and below, press 
upon it; an engine of slaughter terrible not only in driving 
and striking power, but mighty, almost as a thinking organ- 
ism, because of the shrewd, well-disciplined brains which 
operate its wheels, valves and levers. Now like a living 
creature, it rises so near to the surface that, while the 
approaching prey may be distinguished through its project- 
ing orb, yet it cannot itself be seen. Below, on the dial of © 
the periscope human eyes, all alert, decry the form of a 
mammoth ship which holds within her protecting embrace a 
thousand men, women and children. With diabolical delib- 
eration the engines are put to top speed, the range is obtained 


1John 8:44. ; 


} 
. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 155 


and then swinging into position through the deeps of the 
ocean, the levers are raised and the ghastly torpedo is 
launched on its dreadful mission. 


Human Sharks 


On that threatened steamer the crew with the passengers 
are serenely speeding. Some are busily going about their 
duty; others are hardly yet awake in their bunks; others, in 
the saloons, are taking an early breakfast. Little children 
play about the staterooms in their nightgowns. All are per- 
fectly oblivious to approaching danger. Suddenly there is a 
strange thud; the ship gives an ugly lurch; there is a sound 
of crashing timbers, a spiteful hissing of steam, loud, fierce 
blasts from the fog-horn, an ominous noise of inrushing 
waters. ‘Then comes a rapid and appaling listing of the 
decks, a stampede for the boats by terror-stricken passengers, 
piteous shrieks through the air and finally the fatal plunge. 
After all this, and while two or three hundred bodies of 
husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, little 
children, sink steadily down to their graves in the ooze of 
the ocean, the captain of the submarine adjusts the plane of 
his horizontal rudder and dives into safe obscurity. ‘Then 
these human sharks, assured that for them all danger is past, 
at least for the time being, begin to congratulate each other 
on their “good luck” and sit down to eat their breakfast. 

' That description—just as applicable to an attack on a 
warship as on a passenger vessel—is by no means an ex- 
aggeration. Worse than that has happened again and again. 
In my opinion, it is the dirtiest, meanest of all the con- 
temptible “scrapping” on this earth; infinitely worse than 
a dog-fight. There is not a loathsome bully among all the 
most abandoned and brutalized pugilists of the lowest down 
prize-fighting gang on this earth who would permit an an- 
tagonist to hit “below the belt” and run away like that! 

Let self-inflated, well-protected ‘Lords of Admiralty” say 
what they will in defense of this “most effective arm of the 


- 


156 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


naval service,” let bishops and prominent nonconformist 
ministers give, as they may, their benediction to the “heroic 
sailors’ who man such a service, in my opinion a vessel which 
is constructed and used to perform a deed such as I have just 
described is a devilish and despicable sneak of the sea. ‘The 
men who operate it are little less than human fiends. From 
the Christian standpoint there can be absolutely nothing but 
condemnation for them and their infernal machine. ‘The 
kind of warfare it is built to wage is so deeply infamous, 
that even the superhuman intellect of the Devil could hardly 
conceive anything worse. The simple fact that such satamic 
devices, dedicated to such sinister uses, are considered “essen- 
tial to modern warfare,” should be amply sufficient to deter- 
mine all true Christians to leave the material fighting of 
the nations which make and use them severely alone. 


The Bible and the Submarine 


To those tongue-tied, fear-paralyzed preachers who, in 
order to justify such murderous chicanery, juggle with con- 
science and with the words of Jesus—to these I bring the 
whole Bible. The Bible has only one thing to say about all 
who employ or profit by an abomination of that kind. It 
tells us that in the day of reckoning, ““The Lord will abhor 
the bloody and deceitful man.”* It speaks with no uncertain 
note to every young Christian who finds himself being lured, 
by the glamour of “‘patriotic heroism” to undersea warfare, 
in the language of one who, by prophetic knowledge, seems to 
have been well acquainted with the submarine, ‘““My son,” 
it says, “If they say, Come, let us wait for blood, let us lurk 
privily for the innocent without cause; let us swallow them 
up alive as the grave; and whole, as those that go down into 
the pit . . . my son, walk not thou in the way with them; 
refrain thy foot from their path: for their feet run to evil, 
and make haste to shed blood.’ 

Nor does the Bible fail to remind those who enlist for this 


*Psa. 5:6. *Proy. 1:10, 3%, 12, 15. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 157 


undersea abomination that, as they do unto others, so it shall 
be done to them. It seems to give us a glimpse of the fright- 
ful plight of these imprisoned murderers when, searching 
their victims through the bowels of the deep, they find their 
horrible weapon entangled in the snares spread in the waters 
for its undoing. ‘The prophet Micah would appear to de- 
scribe the treacherous methods by which the sailors in these 
mechanical sea serpents catch each other when he tells us 
that, “They all lie in wait for blood, they hunt every man 
his brother with a net.” 


Rather than defend myself and my loved ones by the 
employment of such deviltry, I would commit all to the faith- 
ful care of my Heavenly Father and be riddled through with 
bullets. I would have no fear of consequences. My enemies 
might, for the moment, seem to have triumphed over me, but 
the Lord would do more for the cause of peace by my 
martyrdom than all the submarines in the sea, which can 
never contribute anything but hate and envy to the spirit of 
the nations. 


The Biter Bit 


Before passing from the consideration of the submarine 
and the aeroplane, I may remark that though we have heard 
in this country the loudest kind of denunciation of the uses 
the Germans have made of them, we have neither heard nor 
seen a single word concerning the wrong of the men who 
invented and created them. ‘These were all Americans. 
Uncle Sam has the proud (?) distinction of having launched 
the first of these cowardly skulkeens of the deep. 

He also is the perfecter, if not the originator, of the aero- 
plane, which all the armies alike have used to drop bombs on 
unprotected women and children. Both these instruments, 
like the machine-gun—also an American invention—have 
been doing exactly the kind of work they were fashioned 
and equipped to perform. ‘The launching of the first sub- 


tMicah 7:2, 


158 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


marine was itself a challenge against all the laws of naval 
warfare, which, up to the time of its appearing, were sup- 
posed to be recognized by civilized nations; for the submarine 
is itself a naval anarchistic contrivance. ‘The only nation 
which, in time of war, has found an opportunity for using it is 
Germany and, under similar circumstances, it is not at all im- 
probable, it is highly probable, every other nation would have 
found it impracticable to use it in any other way. ‘The greater 
sin lies at the door of those who brought into being such 
devilish weapons. While this book was being written the 
United States was dragged into the great war because of the 
logical and inevitable uses which she ought to have seen 
the submarine she created would be put to. Submarines were 
not made for naval gentlemen to disclose themselves on, by 
coming to the surface to talk terms and be shot at, they 
were built for assassins whose art it is to stab in the back, 
hit below the belt, and then skedaddle. Having made them 
for this express purpose, it seems rather absurd to kick up 
all this fuss because they carry out their work so well !* 

No, no, my friends, make no mistake. ‘The Christian, for 
achieving his victories, resorts to no such cringing artifices 
as these. He has nothing to hide, he has nothing to fear, for 
the strength of Jehovah’s legions are back of him. He has 
nothing to lose, for his treasures already belong to his King, 
and if forfeited here and now, for His sake, will be returned 
a hundred-fold in the glorious age so soon to come. | 


*See article by Admiral Sims on uses of Submarines by Germans during 
late war. Current Opinion, May, 1923. 


IV. IN THE FOURTH PLACE I CHARGE 
AGAINST WAR THAT IT IS IMMORAL 
BECAUSE IT CONDONES MURDER 


It is often boasted that “civilization” has done much to 
ameliorate the sufferings of those who participate in modern 
battles. It is an assertion which needs careful testing. Con- 
cerning the development in deceptive tactics, and the fright- 
ful increase in the destructive power of modern implements, 
I have already spoken. Remember we do not hear every- 
thing. It is pretty safe to say we do not today hear, by any 
means, the worst things about battle-fields. Once in a while, 
some gruesome picture, some horrible portrayal of the 
hideous orgy of anguish and blood, slipping past the censor, 
reaches us and sends a chill down our spines. But I think 
if we knew all—if the people knew all, aye even if all the 
soldiers knew all—there would arise a shriek of vengeance, 
the vibrations of which would shake every War-Lord from 
his seat of office and topple the crowns off all the royal brows 
in the world. No, we don’t know all! There’s the sor- 
row. Satan works nearly as much havoc in the world 
through ignorance as he does through arrogance. But we 
know a little. Some time back I saw a picture which all but 
engraved itself on my brain. It was a photograph of a dead 
body, hatless but otherwise fully equipped with heavy march- 
ing regalia. ‘The rifle had fallen to the ground, but the 
hand which had grasped it, like the corpse, was suspended 
from a barbed-wire entanglement. The sharp spikes were 
so interwoven with the garments that it looked as though 
the poor fellow had been blown bodily by the blast of a 
shell on to the cruel teeth of this steel web, and hung there 
too fearfully wounded to extricate himself. Who shall 
measure the horror of the hours that may have passed ere 
death ended his agonies? 


159 


160 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Hell on Earth 


During the war I read in the Chicago Daily Journal a 
description by a United Press Staff correspondent which, 
since he gives his name, bears all the marks of reliability. 
Let me read it to you: 


“One reason why the Germans retreated along the Ancre was 
because they were fast becoming a garrison of gibbering lunatics. 
Their position had become more hideous than the scuppers of hell. 
Mud—bottomless in places—and the ceaseless pounding of the 
British guns had turned their positions into stench-pits too horrible 
for human nerves to stand. 

“J zig-zagged around stagnant cesspools and interlocking shell- 
craters in which the water was the exact color of blood.... I 
found myself stepping on German bodies which littered the region. 
They were in all imaginable conditions and positions—sometimes 
piled several deep. I saw arms sticking full length out of mud 
that concealed all else of the bodies to which they were attached. 
There were legs, feet, half bodies—or heads alone—protruding. 
ee lay face down, some were on their backs, exactly as if 
asleep. 

“At another place, on a pile several deep, lay a boyish officer, 
fair as a girl, with his arms thrown back and his blue eyes staring 
to the sky. His sandy hair had been brushed back modishly by 
the rain. 

“Imagine scenes like this covering miles. Imagine every trace 
of vegetation long since blasted away. Imagine the earth powder- 
stained and churned up from ten to sixty feet in depth. Imagine 
mud so bottomless that the German prisoners claim there were 
men frequently swallowed up whole in attempting to cross after 
dark. 

“Such was the sink-hole occupied by the Germans.” 


If these are the surroundings and the concommitant 
effects of the Church’s “good fight of faith,’ then we might 
as well close the New Testament as an illusive record of lies 
and admit that Cesar was more in harmony with our modern 
tenets of Christianity than Christ. 


Is War Growing More Merciful? 


I sometimes think if we could, in some way, concentrate 
all the torture endured by wounded men during the last 
fifteen years as they have lain with broken legs, dislocated 
ankle-bones, fractured skulls, smashed noses, protruding eyes; 
all those who have waited with a bayonet wound through 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 161 


the liver, or a lung exuding blood, or a gaping hole in which 
the imbedded lead was doing its deadly work—waited 
through the long drawn out hours when the cursed “‘curtain 
of fire’ from far distant guns cut them off from all assist- 
ance—I say if somehow we could put all that agony together 
and impress it on the heart of mankind, the world would 
then find out that war was never so cruel, and never in- 
flicted so much mortal pain as it does today. 

Notwithstanding all this, there are a few merciful provi- 
sions which do, to some extent, tend to mitigate these hor- 
rors. Chief among these are the Field Hospital Service and 
the Red Cross Societies. The vision of ambulances, rushing 
into danger zones to rescue the wounded, is one which 
touches a tender spot in all hearts. No compassionate soul 
could do other than thank God for this one bright gleam 
across war’s dark night of bitterness and bloodshed. More- 
over, it is the one place on the battle-field where a true 
Christian, providing he is faithful to his convictions, and 
maintains his independence, can yet find an opportunity to 
serve Him Who ever succored the suffering, and cared for 
the souls and bodies of men. 


The Devil’s Devices 


But having gladly and truly admitted this, I want to 
sound a note of warning to professed followers of Christ 
concerning this, and similar “callings,” which throw open 
the door of military or semi-military service to the Soldier 
of the Cross. I would say beware! ‘There is reason for 
extreme caution. 

If you study the histories of the Devil’s most destructive 
institutions, you will find he has always arranged so as to 
have it possible that good and decent people might patronize 
his greatest agencies for the undoing of men, in a way which 
would not necessarily entail any extravagant or outspoken: 
evil. By this means he has managed to cast a glamour of 
innocence, and sometimes even utility, over what has be- 


162 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


come unspeakably wicked. ‘Thus the respectable uses, as it 
were, of these abominations have not only proved the means 
for luring Christians into their snares, but have made it 
possible for them to give such evils their patronage and 
support, 

Take one or two examples. Look at the immoral drama. 
Why do so many professing Christians patronize it? It is 
because—although quite foreign to its true spirit and gen- 
eral tenor—there are here and there brought on to the stage 
what are called “good clean plays.” ‘These serve to show 
what is described as the “uplifting influence of the dramatic 
art” and they provide an excuse for its defense by those who 
otherwise would, for no consideration, have anything to do 
with the theater. 

Again, consider that vice-inflaming pleasure—the dance. 
Full well Christians know what a blight this brings upon 
much of the young life around them. Why do they sanction 
it? It is because Satan has cunningly contrived to have this 
amusement patronized in the most ‘respectable society” 
as a “social function” and—the “family dance.” Here, 
surrounded by protecting influences of parental love, the 
glow of sensuous sparks in young breasts can be enjoyed, 
while the flames of lust may be smothered. Dancing under 
such conditions we are told is “‘so delightfully social,” “so 
innocently pleasurable in its grace of movement,” that it 
may be tolerated by those who, did they see only its dire 
and inevitable fruitage in moral corruption, would denounce 
and discard it forever. 

This deceitful method is also employed in connection with 
gambling. ‘The taste for this disastrous habit is most fre- 
quently acquired at the card table in respectable homes 
amid the best society. Were it not for the fact that playing 
for money and prizes was approved of by decent people, the 
human wreckage in the world through gambling would 
have long ago resulted in universal effort to destroy that 
vice. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 163 


Temperance Supporting Drunkenness 


Observe also the working of this policy in relation to 
the drink trafic. ‘Though it may seem like a contradiction to 
say sO, it is none the less true that temperance, a virtue 
though it is, has proved the most serious hindrance to the re- 
moval of this scourge—this scandal of modern times. I 
always believe the Devil had something to do with the nam- 
ing of the organizations established to fight drink when they 
were christened “temperance” societies. “Temperance is 
always the enemy of total abstinence. It is ever the less 
nervous, placid, unexcitable, “temperate” people who stand 
so obstructively in the way of the only policy which can save 
the high-strung, hot-blooded, passionate crowd who get tipsy. 
It is the clean, good, quiet, self-possessed well-disciplined 
“set” in “nice church homes,” who “say grace’ over their 
“little drops; who tell us how much higher it is in the 
scale of human character to be able to “resist”? than to shut 
off all possibility of temptation by “abstaining ;” these are the 
people who have most ably assisted the Devil in serving out 
distilled damnation to their weaker brothers and sisters. 
The moderate drinking habit, in these very proper, exceed- 
ingly respectable homes, has provided the most formidable 
argument in favor of the drink traffic. It has given so-called 
Christians the most plausible excuse for compromising with 
the trade, and it has, more than any other thing, helped to 
keep the dirty, whiskey-soaked “pubs” and saloons of Eng- 
land and America going. 

Other instances of this principle of the Devil’s working 
might be given, especially in the sphere of religion, where 
it will be found that every fake theology and fanatical creed 
finds defenders because of some great truth it has mixed 
with its error, or some neglected doctrine it has brought to 
light. But enough for our purpose here has been stated.? 


1For enlargement on this subject see “The Wiles of the Devil,” by 
the same author, 


164 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Popularizing Bloodshed 

Nowhere does this very astute satanic policy more strik- 
ingly reveal itself than in the war-sphere. Here again, 
amid all the frightful hellishness of destruction and carnage, 
we see certain institutions which are everywhere command- 
ing not only the approval, but the enthusiastic applause, the 
heartiest support, of the very people who, on the one hand 
shout loudest for war and on the other are most opposed to it. 
Now as regards these institutions what I want most to em- 
phasize is this. They set before the followers of Christ 
a tempting snare which, if they are not very careful will 
entangle them in the bloody web of militarism, causing them 
not only to join hands with those who shed blood, but (and 
this is far more serious) to give the sanction of the Christian 
Church to the abomination of war. 

All that I have already said is confirmed by the extraordi- 
nary and universal interest in Red Cross work always mani- 
fested by certain “high up” sections of society immediately 
the “war dogs” are let loose. ‘The strange thing is that 
most of these people who get so busy boosting up parties, 
bazaars, socials, sewing and knitting classes, to make ban- 
dages, cushions, sweaters and garments for those they 
already see, in mental vision, brought home with bleeding 
wounds—most of these are not the parties who struggle 
against the enormous pressure of public passion—fostered by. 
all the powers of hell and a yelping press—which pushes 
a nation into strife. Nor are they, nine times out of ten, 
the people who manifest any particular interest, in either the 
bodies or souls of the unfortunate, at any other time. Least 
of all are they, with a few exceptions, the “set”? who seem 
to care a rap about the spiritual well-being of either soldiers 
or civilians. ‘The vast majority of these Red Cross people 
are never found at prayer-meetings and not too often at 
Church. They will work like Trojans, seven days a week 
to secure money to purchase lint and linen and all the outfit 
of a hospital, but they wouldn’t get off a lounge or give 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 165 


a dime to help stop their country going down into a welter 
of blood, or to preach the Gospel of love even were it to a 
thousand souls. 

Here is a specimen of this activity which I read during the 
late war in one of the Chicago daily papers: 


“The fervor of the Red Cross spirit has taken a firm grip on 
the wives, mothers and daughters of the Four Hundred—to say 
nothing of the spirit displayed by the husbands and brothers in the 
face of this tremendous preparedness propaganda that has Chi- 
cago by the throat. 

“Hitherto calm, poised and leisurely women are become veritable 
speeders in dashing from one class to another, and on arrival at 
the base hospitals go at their work of rolling bandages, knitting 
soldiers’ garments and packing emergency kits with all the avidity 
of the sweatshop girl, whose wages depend upon the amount of 
work accomplished.” 


One feels like asking, “Is this real devotion to suffering 
humanity? Are these women actuated by a true love for 
the Lord Jesus, and are they so concerned about the Red 
Cross because of their devotion to the cause of the Cross of 
Calvary?” I trow not. 


The Danger of a Christless Service 


Is there not ground, then, for concluding that the Devil 
is resorting to the same old policy which has served him so 
well as regards the liquor traffic and other evil enterprises of 
his? Has he not, since the days when the sainted Florence 
Nightingale tiptoed with her lamp from couch to couch in 
the pestilential hospitals of Scutari, done his best to exploit 
such a mission of mercy, in order that the sinister avocation 
of bloodshed may be softened and exonerated by accompany- 
ing deeds of kindness? I am afraid he has. ‘This is the rea- 
son why, while there are doubtless a number of truly con- 
secrated followers of Christ, who, constrained by His love, 
go to serve the suffering on the battle-fields, there are a far 
greater number who go for the love of mere adventure or 
to win the halo of earthly glory. 

Thousands of such physicians, nurses, stretcher-bearers, 
ambulance drivers, know nothing of the love of God which 


166 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


was shed abroad in the heart of Florence Nightingale and 
which, long before she saw the afflicted soldiers in the 
Crimea, sent her to the ragged schools of London to practice 
Christ’s sympathy and preach His Gospel to the poor little 
street urchins there. It is one thing to go into the Red 
Cross service out of devotion to Christ, it is quite another 
to go for the glamour of military distinction or the praise of 
influential men. For the Christian, that makes just all the 
difference. ‘That is why it behooves him to “walk circum- 
spectly” concerning this matter. 


Repair Aiding Destruction 


In the arena of war the contrast is quite startling between 
a system and mechanism which destroys and methods and 
machinery for protection and repair. “Thus we see face to 
face with each other, in the battle-fields of today on the one 
hand, Medical Science as exemplified in the administration 
of the most approved remedies, the performance of marvelous 
surgical feats, and on the other hand, Military Science, 
which reveals itself in the most terrible instruments of tor- 
ture, death and devastation ever known to man. ‘Though 
the contrast is sharp, these two things are not so opposed to 
each other as one might presume. Indeed, on reflection it 
will be found that in the grim game of war they compliment 
each other. ‘The sanitary brigades of the Army Medical 
Corps hide away the corpses with which the “chivalrous” 
infantry bestrew the landscape, and the ambulances carry 
back out of range for repair broken bodies smashed by the 
most “gallant” artillery. Each of these arms of the military 
service is in reality assisting each other. ‘They all earn the 
order of merit in the public mind. 


Salve for Troubled Consciences 


Hence the need for caution on the part of the Christian. 
Hospital work attached to an army may have the effect of 
blinding his mind to the antichristian nature of war. People 


~ 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 167 


who approve of war, and yet to whom the gruesome facts 
of pestilential trenches, fields of decomposing bodies, hos- 
pitals full of groaning sufferers, are “very distressing,” find 
relief from the prods of a troubled conscience by centering 
their thoughts on the “truly Christ-like bravery” of fear- 
less men and devoted women who, in ‘“‘our noble ambulance 
brigades” and benevolent hospitals, risk their lives to save 
others. Yet there isn’t, after all, much merit in jumping into 
a river to save a man whom you’ve done your best to drown, 
but who, in spite of you, by some accidental circumstance, 
is still kept afloat—more especially when you intend to pitch 
him into the river again! While without doubt it is better 
to have such a system of mercy as the Field Hospital than to 
be without it, yet its existence is in no sense a palliation for 
bloodshed. Nor does it prove that war in itself has become 
less barbarous or cruel. On the other hand, it is easy to 
see how it renders it more possible of continuance by the 
mitigation of consequences which would, under modern con- 
ditions, have long ago rendered it intolerable, at least to the 
Christian conscience. 


Decent Disposal of Disgusting Butchery 

Notwithstanding all the splendid achievements which 
must justly be credited to the medical service in war, it can- 
not be gainsaid that it does help the Devil to gloss over an 
army’s disgusting butchery to have some very effective 
scientific sanitary method for dealing with its gruesome re- 
sults. Dead bodies of husbands, sons, sweethearts, comrades, 
if left too long to rot in the sun, would bring home too effect- 
ually the horrors of the inhuman system by which kings, em- 
perors and governments settle their quarrels or fight for 
national estates. Besides, this shocking war-garbage breeds 
disease, and disease is a more formidable enemy than all 
the bayonets of the foe. Better for the military system to 
have these bodies, so beloved in the home-land, expeditiously 
smothered in charcoal and lime, and pitched into ditches. 


~ 


168 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


They will then be safely out of sight of their comrades, 
where their lacerated limbs will tell no tales. 


Slaughter and the “Morale” of the Army 

The alertness of army experts to the damaging effect of a 
too free exposure of war’s results to the “warriors” under 
their command, may be gathered from two further extracts 
taken from “The Soldier’s Pocket Book,” by our old friend 
Viscount Wolseley. Speaking of the effect of the presence 
of wounded men on the “morale” of their fighting comrades, 
he says: 

“The savage . . . sharpens his knife with which he means to 
torture and kill any of our wounded that may have the misfortune 
to be left behind unprotected. ...In the Soudan as each man 
fell wounded he had to be carried for protection inside that mov- 
able and livable redoubt the ‘square.’ ... This had a demoraliz- 
ing influence upon our men. The immediate presence among them 
of mutilated comrades, many of them in extreme agony from 
their wounds, is not calculated to improve their spirits.” 

And again, when speaking of the burying of the dead, he 
Says: 

“The French, who wisely studied every trifle that might affect 
the morale of their soldiers, used to bury the dead from the large 
general hospital, before daybreak in the morning. This should 
always be done where practicable. If on the seashore, the dead 
might be taken out daily a few miles and buried at sea. But 
care must be taken to prevent them rising to the surface or being 
washed ashore, a circumstance that cieated much horror in our 


army in Egypt when hundreds of bodies that had been buried 
at sea were washed ashore.” 


It would seem that these great generals, under whose 
calm and calculating direction the most horrible slaughter 
is perpetrated, are most punctilious about concealing, as far 
as they can, the “horror” of it all from their soldiers. 


The Military Profession and Blood 


Indeed so they need be, they know quite well that nothing — 


is so detrimental to the military “profession” as blood. One 
reason it thrives so well by the business of blood-shedding is 
because it is so skilled in the art which heals the wounds 
and hides the blood-stains. If the regalia in which the sol- 


a — 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 169 


dier appears in the trenches, in the hospitals, or in the mo- 
ment of his dying agony could take the place of the gaudy 
trappings of the parade-ground; if the insignia on the buz- 
bies of death-head huzzars were the real bones and skulls of 
their victims; if the brilliant tunics of the barracks were 
smeared with the decomposing blood which stains them on 
the battle-fields; if the gay officers could walk through the 
halls of wealth beneath the gaze of their gentle-eyed lady 
friends bedecked in the ragged and gory uniforms which 
enshroud their buried comrades at the front; if field marshals 
and generals exchanged their silver-plaited swords for the 
physician’s scalpel and probe and enumerated the feet, legs, 
arms, hands, eyes, which had been cut away in consequence 
of engagements they had commanded; if all the blood which 
has been shed in battle could be sprinkled over all the sol- 
diers who go to fight and the discolored faces of the strangled 
sailors who bestrew the bed of the sea could peep through 
the port-holes and over the gunwales of every dreadnaught, 
then spectacles so sanguinary would raise the peoples of all 
nations in revolt against so monstrous and ruinous a system 
as war. 


Murder Hiding Behind Mercy 


But the Devil is far too clever to let this side of war so 
display itself. Hence he has seen to it that developments in 
the Red Cross and the medical services are kept abreast of 
the ever increasing power of modern destructive instruments. 
The ghastly fruits of battle are, even at risk of other good 
- lives, sought out and rushed in cushioned automobiles to hos- 
pitals which, being equipped with every earthly device for 
healing, are invested with a halo of mercy. The hospital 
thus becomes a kind of exculpation of slaughter. The Devil 
so abuses it as to make it a means by which murder may hide 
itself behind mercy. This is why it provides a special snare 
for Christians, for unless they resolve to preach the Gospel of 
love to those they wait upon, they may by this means find 


170 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


themselves actually serving the Devil in the name of Jesus 
Christ. 

Never forget that I am dealing with this subject from the 
Christian standpoint. From the standpoint of the unre- 
generate world, the military hospital service is undoubtedly 
an altogether admirable institution. But what belongs solely 
to this age will pass with this age, ““That which is born of the 
flesh is flesh.” Those who seek such agencies purely for 
the aid they give them in pursuing only the gains of this 
world will verily by them “have their reward” here—not 
hereafter. The fact that one is allied to the Red Cross ser- 
vice does not prove one is a Christian. Sympathy is not 
Christianity. Many men sympathize with their horses. The 
Lord is not so much concerned about what we do as He is 
in why we do it. On the battle-field or in the hospital, as 
elsewhere, it is the cup of water given in His name—and 
remember you cannot separate His name from His nature, 
which is love, nor can you separate His name from His 
Gospel, which is “Love your enemies”—it is the deed done 
in that name which He will recognize and reward and no 
other. Remember, too, in this connection, that for the 
Christian, no snares are so dangerous as those which offer 
him Christian facilities without Christian forces back of 
them. The people who offer the fruits of Christianity while 
they deny their roots are those whose co-partnership, in the 
service of men, the Christian needs to be most cautious of. 
It is the Devil’s trump-card for this age to set men endeavor- 
ing to save the world without Christ. Like the robber he is, 
he seeks to steal and profit by the consequences of Chris- 
tianity, while denying its divine causes. 


Science Without Salvation 


Hence, in this matter of hospital service we see every 
method for soothing and healing the sick extolled but the 
healing which is by faith in Jesus Christ. We have the 


14John 3:6. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 171 


systems of healing according to Harvey, Jenner, Pasteur, 
Lister, Koch, but hardly ever a word concerning the gospel 
of healing by the Son of God. We have stethoscopes, clinical 
thermometers, microscopes, the ophthalmoscope, the laryngo- 
scope and some other “scopes” for the diagnosis of disease, 
but the Word of God, that great searcher after the disorders 
of the spirit, is too often left severely alone. ‘These phy- 
sicians are artists at bacteriological causes of trouble, but 
how few of them know how to deal with that great first 
cause of all suffering, the virus of sin in the deceitful heart 
of man. Wonderful, indeed, are the appliances for the 
penetrating light of the R6ntgen and the Finsen rays, but 
how many of those who operate such instruments know any- 
thing about the “light from heaven,’ which the wounded 
soldier so sorely needs to see shining around his death bed. 
Here is the perilous danger for the young Christian who, 
shrinking from the sneers of the world, because of his ‘“‘paci- 
fist” ideas, sees in the Red Cross a way of escape. And 
truly, if he takes his Saviour with him and is resolved at all 
costs to speak out the truth of His teaching, there is a sphere 
of wonderful usefulness midst the suffering which there, as 
nowhere else, brings men’s sins home to them. 
But with a message of that kind would he be wanted ? 


The Geneva Cross and the Cross of Calvary 


Let him then be careful how he allows his testimony to 
be silenced by men whose profession of slaughter is as far as 
the poles are asunder from the spirit and practice of his 
Master; men who beneath the sign of the Geneva cross 
would profit by the beneficent fruits of the Saviour’s suf- 
fering while they ignore the claims on their hearts and 
lives of that other cross on Calvary. 

That the guns should never be trained on the Red Cross 
service is, without doubt, a most merciful provision—credit- 
able, when it is observed, to a humane sentiment which is 
itself a product of Christianity—but with God and the 


172 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


angels such protection, however beneficial to the life that 
now is, is a small consideration when compared with that 
shelter from the wrath to come which the sinner who trusts 
in Christ finds beneath the blood which flowed from the 
Cross of Jesus. Christians must above all things take care 
that in seeking to give that service which is assured by the 
protection of the Geneva Convention, they don’t forfeit 
the higher service which can only be rendered by the terms 
of the contract sealed at Golgotha. | 

If, then, Christian workers in these war hospitals would 
be loyal to God, they must deal faithfully with the souls of 
those they serve. There is a tendency to regard the wounded 
under their care only as “heroes” suffering in a “noble 
cause.” But, though one should say so with the utmost 
tenderness, they are more than that. ‘They too have been 
ageressors. They too have brought like disaster on other 
brave men who are also fighting for what they too consider 
a “holy cause.” 

To condone wrong on the part of the aggressor because 
of the wrong he himself has suffered would not, after all, 
be real Christian service. A Christian cannot allow such 
ageressors to altogether ignore the injuries they have in- 
flicted on others on account of misfortunes which have be- 
fallen them while inflicting those injuries. This is espe- 
cially so when it is remembered that the men in the hos- 
pitals intend, if able, to continue their offensive acts. Don’t 
forget that, according to the latest computation, seventy per 
cent. of the wounded return to the fighting line. 


Praising the “Warrior” and Winking at War 
The danger in this direction is forcibly illustrated in many 
printed accounts and diaries published by prominent workers 
among the sick and wounded. As an example, I was much 
impressed in reading a record sent from time to time by one 
- of my own devoted nieces who in the late war rendered good 
service at the front. ‘Through the whole of her book, while 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 173 


again and again she invariably speaks of the sufferers around 
her as “heroes,” she says never a word about the agony these 
very men have inflicted on the “heroes’ who fill the 
hospitals of the opposing armies. Had she thought of these 
her sympathies might have gone out, for the same good rea- 
son, to the wounded who, in those equally crowded wards, 
were being crowned with honor for the shot and shell they 
had poured upon her own patients. ‘To go in the name of 
Jesus Christ to a wounded soldier with sympathy for his 
suffering and praise for his ‘heroism’ while keeping a dis- 
creet silence concerning the suffering he has inflicted, and 
still intends, if he is again able, to inflict on other soldiers, 
will doubtless help to calm his misgivings and thus aid his 
physical recovery, but it will never appeal to his conscience 
or help his soul into the victory of the Gospel which is the 
victory of love. 

Though their praises have been so trumpeted through the 
world, I fear the Lord Jesus has not found many among the 
Red Cross attendants to carry HIS words to the sick and 
the dying about “doing good to the enemies who had so 
despitefully used them.” Getting forgiveness from Him 
conditionally upon their willingness to forgive those who 
had “‘trespassed against them,” has not, I fear, been an aspect 
of the truth which has received much attention. But Christ 
put the greatest possible emphasis upon it.t| With Him, 
there was no forgiveness on any other terms. 


Compromise the Undoing of Christianity 


Another application of this aspect of the question I feel 
it indispensable that I should make. It is, I know, an ex- 
tremely delicate and difficult one. But duty to the whole 
counsel of God demands it. Since I feel that a treatment 
of this vital subject, which permits no prevarication, is the 
supreme need of the hour, I will say a few words here even 
at the risk of being misunderstood. 


1Matt. 6:14. 


174 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Not all the obstacles put together which Christianity has 
encountered since Christ founded His Church have been 
half as great a hindrance to the progress of His cause as the 
spirit of compromise on the part of those professing His 
Name. The power of the religion of Jesus lies in its abso- 
lute opposition to the spirit and practice of the unbelieving 
world. It is the sword of truth which when its edge has 
not been blunted by inconsistency and its wielding has been 
in the hands of faithful men, has cut its way triumphantly 
through every opposing force. Its defeats have ever been 
due to the dulling of its edge. Of Christianity it may well 
be said that the attempt to readjust its fundamental doc- 
trines to unbelieving intellectualism; the “re-statement” of 
its miracles in “terms of modern thought;” the depreciation 
of everything in its Bible which is not amenable to material- 
istic “scientific method ;” the toning down of its precepts to 
suit the practices of an apostate discipleship; and above all 
the fatal attempt to dodge the inevitable deductions of its 
teachings to suit the notions of a worldly and state-controlled 
Church—these have been the predominant factors in the in- 
consistency which has retarded the progress of this Chris- 
tianity in the world. 


God’s Ministers Should Preach God’s Love 

Nor does it need to be said to those who are enlisted in 
the ministry of the Gospel that its all-essential quality is 
love. This was the predominant note in all the teachings 
of Christ. This was the center and circumference, the alpha 
and the omega, of all He preached, as it was the all-prevail- 
ing characteristic manifesting itself through all His deeds. 
He came to reveal His Father as the passionate lover of all 
men and to usher in a new Dispensation under a Covenant 
of Grace sealed by His own precious blood. ‘The Gospel 
itself is God’s message of love. ‘God so loved’”—‘‘God is 
love” —‘He loved us and gave Himself for us.” The New 
Testament is packed full of exhortations to “Love one an- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 175 


other” even as Christ has loved us and gave Himself for 
us. Nor, according to its teaching, is the real test of our 
religion the fact of our affection for our friends, brethren, 
fellow-countrymen only, for Jesus Himself gave us that 
measure when He said, “Love... as I have loved you,’ and 
we know “God commendeth his love toward us, in that 
while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.”! He didn’t 
fight His enemies, He died for them. 

Now what a “Christian worker,” a Y. M. C. A. director, 
a Salvation Army officer, an officially commissioned and fully 
“equipped” chaplain of the forces, what these have to make 
sure of in order that their services may be recognized, is that 
they are there to preach God’s Gospel. They are not to go 
there to seek the approval of a godless press, a shallow Chris- 
tendom, a murder-enriched aristocracy or doomed temporal 
governments. From the Christian standpoint such approval 
matters very little. What these busy toilers on the bloody 
fields of war have to be certain of is that they are there in 
obedience to God’s voice when He says to them, ‘Preach 

. the preaching that I bid thee.” 


“These Sayings of Mine” 

Never were even the more devoted laborers in the Mas- 
ter’s vineyard up against so deceitful a trap for catching them 
unawares and making them the playthings of a lot of human 
bloodhounds as they are these days. ‘Those who long to 
assuage the misery of war or turn to the best advantage 
the opportunity which huge camps of armed men affords for 
doing good, need to be on their guard lest they subordinate 
spiritual duty to temporal service. The minister of the 
Gospel’s supreme business in the military camp, as every- 
where else, is to PREACH THE GOSPEL. To preach it 
in all its purity and power, subtracting nothing and adding 
nothing thereto. His dynamics are not the alluring comfort 
of sheltering “huts;” the inebriation of ‘cups of tea;” the 


1Rom. 5:8, 


176 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


economy of “convenient writing utensils”; the pleasure of 
“social intercourse ;” the relaxation of “libraries” full of fic- 
tion and magazines; the recreation of “entertainments” with 
gramophones that wind out national and music-hall love- 
songs; it is mot even the sentiment of “religious services’’ 
with catchy hymns and clever sermonettes interwoven with 
plenty of ‘patriotism,’ and out of which all unpleasant 
references to tomorrow’s beasty bloodshed and all “‘inexpedi- 
ent” applications of the Sermon on the Mount are carefully 
extracted. No! No! His dynamic is the mighty power of 
the Holy Ghost. He is to preach the preaching GOD HAS 
GIVEN HIM. The everlasting Gospel of LOVE, the 
blessings of which are appropriated by OBEDIENCE and 
faith. ‘The Gospel which plants men’s feet on the unmoy- 
able rock of TRUTH and not on the shifting sands of 
SENTIMENT. 

“Therefore,” said the great Master Himself, “everyone 
that heareth these sayings of mine’—the “sayings” of the 
Sermon on the Mount—‘‘and doeth them, I will liken him 
unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock, and 
everyone that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them 
not, shall be likened unto a foolish man which built his 
house upon the sand—and great was the fall of it.” Let 
us then beware of a sinking-sand ministry. We must be 
careful to see that we do not do everything for, and say 
everything fo the soldier but the things he most requires and 
the preaching he most needs to hear. ‘The question put by 
the Lord through His servant Isaiah to back-slidden Israel 
is one which I commend to chaplains and Christian workers 
in the camps of the world today: ‘Will ye steal, murder 
and commit adultery, and swear falsely (spying). 

Come and stand before me in this house, which is called by 
my name and say, We are delivered to do all these abomina- 
tions?’ 


1Jeremiah 7:9, Io. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 177 


Certain Truths for Certain Places 


There are certain conditions which give the challenge to 
particular aspects of truth. It is better to keep away from 
the conditions unless we are armed with the needed message 
and prepared with a sufficiency of courage to give it. 

In the citadel of lust one must preach purity; in the 
stronghold of drunkenness one must preach abstinence; in 
the den of the thief one must preach honesty, and in the war 
zones, which, in addition to being the breeding grounds 
for every other villainy, are supremely the spheres of revenge 
and hate, we must preach forgiving Jove. All, of course, 
through Christ. ‘There is no option. Every Christian is 
on the horns of a merciless dilemma instantly he enters an 
armed camp. He must be a traitor to the teachings of his 
Master or he must oppose the brutalizing profession which 
thrives by the shedding of blood. All his surroundings sum- 
mon him to make his choice. The tramp of bayoneted men, 
the gingle of artillery, the clash of drawn sabers, the deep 
thunder of distant guns—all put the question as through a 
megaphone into his ear—‘‘Which will you preach to these 
teeming thousands around you, who on the morrow go to 
die, deliverance by gunpowder or salvation by grace? Which 
doctrine will you propound, redemption by the red blood of 
the foe wiping out insult and injury, or redemption by the 
shed blood of Christ?” ‘These questions must be answered. 
The servant of God cannot remain silent, for silence under 
such conditions is a cowardly traitorship. He finds him- 
self in the midst of conditions which he detests, which he 
openly admits are appalling and ghastly. He is there to 
try and undo something of the damage, but he finds him- 
self, unless very careful a creature of the very system he 
loathes. He has only to remain speechless, and his very 
presence becomes an unspoken acquiescence. He may quickly 
drift into the position of one who, hating the drink, never- 
theless helps the brewer to sell his beer. One who, detesting 
the moral filth of brotheldom, is all the time winking at 


178 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


the dealer in white slaves, who, while upholding every- 
thing that is just and honorable, is none the less profiting by 
his friendship with boodlers. ‘To a real Christian, such a 
procedure would be a monstrous hypocrisy. 

Better far never go into the sectors where the fight is 
fiercest in the firing lines of the battle between truth and 
falsity, where the great issues in all their naked reality and 
relentless logic present themselves for examination and 
judgment, better never go there than go without the courage 
to face and answer them in accord with conscience and the 
Word of God. 

War Camp “Worship” 

To shirk these obligations not only brings those who prac- 
tice such equivocation into disrepute with the soldiers—who 
are under no illusion about the implication of the Gospel of 
the Lord Jesus—but imperils all religion as it is exemplified 
by the Church. This is strikingly illustrated by yet another 
quotation from Sergeant Empey’s Church-trumpeted book 
Over the Top. 


Referring to chaplains and soldier-worship, he explains 
how that when asked his religion he replied, “Oh, any old 
thing,’ and being put down Church of England, where for 
all soldiers worship—like war—is compulsory, he explains 
how he was forced to go to Church, “with rifle, bayonet and 
one hundred and twenty rounds of ammunition.’ 

Nothing could surpass this man’s description for shoaeee 
exactly the kind of “worship” common to war camps and 
the mockery it makes of Christ’s teaching while professing to 
exalt His authority. Sergeant Empey goes on: 

At the end of this field the chaplain was standing in a limber. 
We formed a semicircle around him. Overhead there was a black 
speck circling round and round in the sky. This was a German 
Fokker. ‘The chaplain had a book in his left hand—left eye 
on the book—right eye on the aeroplane. We Tommies were 
lucky, we had no books, so had both eyes on the aeroplane. After 


church parade we were marched back to our billets and played 
football all afternoon.” 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD kT 


Here you have the true juxtaposition of affairs. On the 
one hand the chaplain, professed servant of Christ, reading 
the Gospel of love from the New Testament and trying to 
make it square with the armed men before him and the aero- 
plane above his head—surely a most difficult bit of the- 
ological maneuvering—and on the other hand the honest 
Tommies who, having little heart-esteem for those who try 
to harmonize the sort of business required of soldiers with 
the example of the Christ of Calvary, are concentrating their 
attention on aeroplanes, bayonets and the bullets in their 
bandeliers, having long since come to the conclusion that 
religion is—“any old thing!’’ 


Carnal Conversion 

One more extract in this connection I must quote from 
a book entitled 4 Student in Arms. 

Judged by the eulogies secured for this book from min- 
isters, and considering its enormous sale, chiefly among pro- 
fessing Christians, it may be regarded as a correct expres- 
sion of the views of the majority of the Churches. It is also 
a complete exemplification of the kind of gospel adaptable 
to war. 


After careful search through its pages, I cannot find one 
single reference to that definite work of conversion by faith 
in Christ’s atoning blood which Jesus Himself, with every 
Apostle who followed Him, insisted upon as the paramount 
condition of salvation. ‘The entire production is a clever 
treatise which, while altogether ignoring the ‘‘exceeding sin- 
fulness” of the human heart, attempts to prove that men 
who, under the ordinary circumstances of life, have mani- 
fested every outward sign of godlessness, are suddenly de- 
veloped, “evolved,” by the extraordinary occurrences of war, 
into true Christians without even being conscious of the 
fact, and without experiencing any work of regeneration at 
all. By a brilliant casuistry, most solemn texts in the New 
Testament are made to imply the opposite of their true 


180 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


meaning. Purely natural traits of character, like gener- 
osity, comradeship, carnal bravery, sympathy for suffering 
pals, are classed with the “fruits of the Spirit,” which we 
are asked to believe are suddenly evolved, without that oper- 
ation of the Holy Ghost which alone can make spiritually 
alive. 

This book, under cover of a protested loyalty to Christ’s 
“Jargeness of heart”? and His unsympathetic attitude to a 
lifeless ritualism, constitutes a brilliant sneer at those funda- 
mental doctrines which Christ Himself emphasized and 
which His Spirit-filled followers confirmed concerning the 
condition of man “dead in trespasses and sins,’ needing, 
before all, to be “born again,” not by any change in his 
circumstances, but “from above” by the power of God. 

Take the following as a specimen of this mistaken salva- 
tion by the fury of war rather than by the love of Calvary. 
The author, speaking of a certain class of generous-hearted 
sinners, makes the fatal mistake of minimizing the state of 
“Jost”? souls because they are not yet “damned.” He em- 
phasises greatly this distinction. But the Lord Himself 
smashed all that theory to pieces when He said to Nico- 
demas: ‘He that believeth not is condemned already, be- 
cause he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten 
Son of God.” 

Then the wrong doings of these “lost” ones are described 
in such a way as, either to excuse them, or to convert them 
almost into virtues by comparing them with the wrong-doing 
of other more respectable people who, in God’s sight, are, 
of course, equally “lost.” Then we read: 


“Once more the Lord has walked our streets. Once more He 
has called to the lost sheep to follow the Good Shepherd along 
the thorny path of suffering and death. As of old, He has de- 
manded of them their all. And as of old He has not called in 
vain.” 


Here the Lord Jesus is made to figure as the recruiting 
sergeant or the conscription officer; beckoning, not along 
the “thorny path” which leads to the meek and unresisting 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 181 


death of the Cross, but to the place where every effort is to 
be made, by every conceivable engine of destruction, to in- 
flict, with a minimum of risk to one’s self, the most fright- 
ful “suffering,” perchance death, upon others. Jesus is pic- 
tured asking men to give “their all,”’ not as He gave His all, 
brought ‘“‘as a lamb to the slaughter’”’—“a sheep before her 
shearers—dumb,” but as means which, to their utmost ca- 
pacity, are to be used in shrieking and smiting vengeance. 


Regeneration by Slaughter 

These false premises having been set up, the reckless, 
daring abandon of profligates and spendthrifts, which 
in their citizen experiences, made them “drunken” and 
“loose,” is converted into the consecrated heroism of Christ’s 
followers who count not the cost. But “lost,” “carnal 
minds” can know nothing of the heroism which is esteemed 
of God. After this we reach the grand climax in which 
this book describes how, when these “lost” ones are at last 
“sot out” to the fighting zone, they evolve a kind of counter- 
feit salvation by means of the bloody scramble of the trenches. 


We read: 


“Then at last we ‘got out. We were confronted with dearth, 
danger and death. And then they came to their own. We could 
no longer compete with them. We stolid, respectable folk were 
not in our element. We knew it. We felt it. We were deter- 
mined to go through with it. We succeeded; but it was not with- 
out much internal wrestling, much self-conscious effort. Yet they, 
who had formerly been our despair, were now our glory. Their 
spirits effervesced. Their wit sparkled. Hunger and thirst could 
not depress them. Rain could not damp them. Cold could not 
chill them. Every hardship became a joke. They did not endure 
hardship, they derided it. And somehow it seemed at the moment 
as if derision was all that hardship existed for! Never was such 
a triumph of spirit over matter. As for death, it was, in a way, 
the greatest joke of all. In a way, for if it was another fellow that 
was hit it was an occasion for tenderness and grief. But if one 
of them was hit, ‘O Death, where is thy sting?’ ‘O Grave, where is 
thy victory?’ Portentous, solemn Death, you looked a fool when 
you tackled one of them! Life? They did not value life! They 
had never been able to make much of a fist of it. But if they lived 
amiss they died gloriously, with a smile for the pain and the 
dread of it... . One by one Death challenged them. One by 


* 


182 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


one they smiled in his grim visage, and refused to be dismayed. 
They had been lost, but they had found the path that led them 
home; and when at last they laid their lives at the feet of the 
Good Shepherd, what could they do but smile?” 


But all this is the kind of bravery which two stags will 
manifest when fighting for a mate. It is the self-forgetful- 
ness of a lioness protecting her whelps, the suffering of a 
starving mother-bird giving the worm to her little ones. “O 
Death, where is thy sting??? What a parody is here on 
those immortal words! ‘The sting of death is not the lack of 
carnal bravado in facing death while killing others, no! The 
“sting of death is sin,” and the only remedy for sin is to turn 
from it—not excepting those more glaring forms of it which 
Christ in His strongest utterances forbids—and to rely in 
simple faith upon the finished work of the Cross, remem- 
bering the words of the Lord Jesus Himself, ‘““He that be- 
lieveth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth 
not shall be damned.” 


The Modern Goliath 


The giant who has been stalking through the shambles of 
Europe, the giant who, speaking with the roaring voice of 
cannon and the snarl of machine-guns, has been defying the 
Church of the living Christ, is the Goliath of militarism. 
While I do not for a moment underestimate the service, splen- 
did from the standpoint of this age, which has been rendered. 
by many of the Davids of our time, I cannot refrain from say- 
ing that it seems to me they have been more concerned with 
the machinery which deals out the “corn” the “loaves” and 
the “‘cheeses” for their “brethren” in the “camp,”? than they 
have about the audacious challenge to the Gospel of love 
with which this modern Goliath is mocking Christianity 
before an unbelieving world. Hence, the Church of God, 
as represented within the battle-area of Europe, in face of 
the material armories of nine nations, was not, so far as I 
could discover, able to produce, amid all the exhaustless 


1Mark 16:16. *See 1 Sam, 17:17, 18. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 183 


stream of her spiritual ammunition, a single pebble of 
appropriate truth—nor had she among all her theological 
hosts within the field of military operations a solitary 
hero to hurl that needed pebble at the head of this war- 
monster whose bloody clutch was strangling the world. One 
thing, however, I constantly observed—the men who seemed 
to have gotten into David’s place of authority among the 
Lord’s people were busily and nervously searching for 
theoretical ‘‘pebbles” in defense of this horrible abomina- 
tion. ‘They searched with results which, both as regards 
their missles and the slinging of them, were painful to 


behold! 


The Christian’s Mission to the Wounded 


“Then,” do you say, “are we of the Church of Christ to 
leave the wounded and the dying to perish without our care? 
Are we to close our eyes to the wonderful opportunity 
afforded for reaching men, by these crowded camps and 
prison grounds, where tens of thousands, whose hearts are 
made receptive to spiritual truths, are ready to hear us?” 
No, I reply. We are to go to the wounded and the dying 
with the GOSPEL. We are not to allow the application 
of anesthetics or bandages or the administration of medicine 
to take the place of the ministering of the word of life. 
From the Christian standpoint, a soldier is little bettered 
because he dies as the subject of up-to-date surgical treatment 
if he goes to meet God with blood on his conscience and a 
spirit unprepared by faith in Christ’s atoning work. And 
yet I am afraid doctors and nurses who mixed such a mes- 
sage as this with their soothing words would not be welcome 
in the wards of military hospitals. 

Meetings held among fighting men are of little worth in 
the estimation of God, unless they are occasions for preaching 
the truth as it is in Jesus. Let, therefore, the Christian 
worker or the “chaplain” go and preach that truth by all 
means, and he will see how long his ministry will be tol- 


184 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


erated. He will soon discover what sort of an “‘opportunity”’ 
is here for the REAL GOSPEL OF CHRIST. Unless I 
am greatly mistaken, his services will be quickly dispensed 
with, his “huts” abandoned, his “social” operations trans- 
ferred to others who, without his unpleasant and obstructive 
Gospel, will be only too glad to rush in with the “loaves 
and the fishes” and get the cheap “glory” this sensuous world 
is ever willing to give to those who administer the bread that 
perishes while ignoring the Bread of Life. 


Gunpowder Preachers 


If ever there was a palpable ‘“‘misfit” as regards men and 
their environment that maladjustment is exemplified in the 
official position of a “chaplain of the military forces.” That 
these officers are often brave men, sometimes risking their 
lives to help others; that they frequently show a true devo- 
tion to the moral interests of the soldiers over whose “spiri- 
tual” charge they preside; that they are often brotherly, 
sympathetic, companionable; that they are sometimes even 
helpful in keeping alive a “religious sentiment” among the 
troops which is conducive to discipline and “‘patriotic” loy- 
alty—all this must be freely admitted. But that they are 
in any sense correct mouthpieces of the message or true rep- 
resentatives of the method of Christ, is most certainly denied 
by the very fact that they remain where they are. More 
easily could oil mix with water, or light and darkness dwell 
together, than can the messenger of PEACE and GOOD- 
WILL, as set forth in the Gospel of the Lord Jesus, dwell 
in the tents of armed men. Fidelity, under such conditions, 
would inevitably spell immediate expulsion. It is a serious 
and strenuous thing to say. It is a very unpleasant thing to 
say, but the time has come to say it. If a chaplain would be 
a true “servant of the Lord,” “‘he must not strive but be gen- 
tle to all men, apt to teach, patient, . . . in meekness instruct- 
ing.” Like his Master, he is to be “meek and lowly in 
heart.”? He is to be one in whom “Jesus Christ might show 

12 Tim. 2:25. *Matt. 11:29. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 185 


forth all long suffering.”’1 If he is to be a faithful ambas- 
sador of the blessed Saviour in the midst of his regiment, he 
must exhort the captains, lieutenants, non-commissioned offi- 
cers and men as they go into action to walk worthy of their 
vocation “as good soldiers of Jesus Christ,” “with all low- 
liness and meekness, with long suffering, forbearing one 
another in love.”? ‘To remember that ‘“‘he that saith he is in 
the light and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until 
now,’ to follow their Divine Commander and coming 
King, Who left them ‘“‘an example that they should follow in 
His steps. ... Who when He was reviled, reviled not again; 
when He suffered He threatened not.”* Where, I won- 
der, in the estimation of the commander-in-chief of an active 
army, would a worthy chaplain stand should he insist on en- 
forcing such conduct upon a regiment? ‘The one thing 
above all others obnoxious to a soldier girdled with horrible 
explosives and panoplied with steel is this talk about “‘meek- 
ness,’ “long suffering,” “lowliness” and ‘“‘reviling not 
again.” He will have none of it. It is foreign to every 
tenet he has been taught in the military academy, the bar- 
racks and the drill-ground. ‘The sentiment of modern 
armies is more exactly expressed in the now standardized bat- 
tle-cry, “Over the top and give them HELL!” 


Opportunity for Shirking Truth 

Concerning, then, the “opportunities” afforded the Chris- 
tian by war to extend the Kingdom of God, I say by all means 
let the servants of Christ seize such chances where they can, 
but let them be sure to tell their hearers that the “Kingdom 
of Christ’? can never be extended among murderers; that be- 
fore God will hear the prayers of those who come to their 
“penitent forms’ they must be reconciled to their brothers 
in the trenches of the enemy—‘First be reconciled to thy 
brother.”> Let them preach the doctrine “thou shalt do no 


SeUemer tone pn, 4:2. *t: John aig. 41 Pet. 2:21,' 23. *Matt: 5:22. 


186 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


murder,” which is just as binding as any other of the com- 
mandments, and though they will get summary notice to 
quit, and lose the favor of an ungodly world with its apostate 
Church, they will get the “well done” of all heaven. Though 
they will doubtless forfeit the cash which so readily comes 
from those who are willing enough to have New Testaments 
distributed in the trenches among the “brave boys,” so long as 
they are mixed with grenades, cartridges, cigarettes, tobacco 
and beer (cash, by the way, which is often a bribe to a 
troubled national conscience), they will lay up for themselves 
wealth in the treasuries of the Glory Land. As to the oppor- 
tunity, it is well to remember that opportunities to shirk the 
truth are not opportunities to preach the Gospel. But never 
fear! Opportunities will come soon and abundantly enough 
elsewhere. ‘They always come with the ghastly reaction of 
war, and when they come these faithful ones will be ready to 
embrace them because they will be agents which the Holy 
Ghost can use and whose honesty, integrity and courage the 
people will have learned to respect.* 


*For further observations on the Christian’s duty to the wounded in 
battle sce “How Militarism Murders Christ” by the same author. 


V. AGAIN, WAR IS IMMORAL BECAUSE IT 
CONDEMNS ITSELF 


The contradictions of the military vocation are amazing! 
Unpardonable sins, punishable by death within the camps of 
one’s own nation, are, from the viewpoint of the enemy's 
headquarters, reckoned deeds of the highest honor. Lying, 
cheating, stealing, killing, if practiced against the enemy, are 
“feats of skill,” sometimes calling for ‘special mention” in 
dispatches and not infrequently winning decorations for 
“extraordinary valor; but let exactly the same things be 
done in the interests of the foe, and no words are bitter 
enough to describe the horror with which they are regarded. 

Thus on one side, what is termed “skilful and daring 
scouting”’ or “‘first-class intelligence work” is described on 
the other as “mean traitorous spying.” On one side such 
conduct earns a medal, on the other it is treated with a 
“drum-head court martial” and a dozen bullets from a firing 
squad. 

Shooting a fellow-soldier in a drunken brawl is a matter 
so serious as to require a judicial inquiry and a solemn death 
penalty, while cutting the throats of fifty fellows on the other 
side of yonder ditch is an achievement for hurrahs and 
drinks all round. 

In one country we find monuments erected to the memory 
of a warrior who in the country across the frontier is re- 
garded as the bloodiest tyrant who ever drew a sword. 


Ministers of the Gospel of Hate 


At St. Paul’s Cathedral in London one sees a bishop con- 
secrating a regiment of fusiliers to the conflict in a “holy 
war” and invoking the blessing of the Almighty upon their 
valorous intention to slay the “abominable Huns.” In the 

187 


188 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


stately Lutheran churches of Berlin the reverend ministers 
assemble with the Synods to pray over Potsdam Guards, that 
divine might may rest upon their arms in annihilating the 
audacious foe of the Fatherland—even the arrogant English- 
men. 

Chaplains try to stand at the same moment for the blood 
which, at the impulse of love, flowed from the Saviour’s 
side and for the blood which, at the impulse of hate, is drawn 
from the enemies’ wounds. “They appear on Sundays in 
drum-head pulpits and, on one side, praise the Lord for 
“the severe chastisement inflicted on our enemies,” etc., while 
on the other side, when surveying in the hospitals the havoc 
of this “chastisement,” they invoke the same Christ to come 
and heal the wounds of His afflicted “warriors” and speedily 
avenge His “‘elect.”’ 

And so the astounding incongruities continue. Lie chal- 
lenges lie and falsity confronts deceit until even the veracity 
of the blessed Saviour is itself involved. Christ is made to 
appear a double-dealing deity leading His creatures to tor- 
ment by acts of superhuman deception that would out rival 
the very Devil himself. ‘The eternally just and holy Jehovah 
is brought, by these gun-loving, state-serving, Bible-juggling 
war advocates, to a lower level than that of the organizer of 
a prize-ring; the instigator of a Lancashire dog-fight or the 
supervisor of a Yorkshire cock-pit, where savage beasts and 
birds are egged on to spill each other’s blood for the pleasure 
of the beholder. Let chaplains pray as they will, they may 
rest assured it is not the God of love who inspires the pas- 
sions of bloody men in opposing armies by giving His bless- 
ing to BOTH sides in order that He may be pleasantly 
excited by their death struggles. It is WAR that thus 
libels the Almighty and so condemns itself. 

War is therefore immoral. 


VI. AGAIN, WAR IS IMMORAL BECAUSE IT 
APPEALS TO HATRED AND REVENGE 


If you would correctly judge the causes that beget it, the 
atmosphere in which it generates, the nourishment upon 
which it thrives, go to the newspapers and read the kind of 
“dope” which crowds their columns when there is the slight- 
est opportunity of inciting to a national quarrel, or when a 
declaration of war is about to be made. It is mental poison. 
Irritating, inflaming, maddening, enraging POISON. It 
is as though unseen legions of lying and infuriating spirits 
had suddenly swooped down upon all the sources of informa- 
tion, the avenues of intelligence, the centers of instruction, 
and had inoculated them with the virus of a vicious dis- 
temper. ‘That prince of modern journalists, the late W. T. 
Stead, spoke for most newspaper editors of the world as 
regards their relation to war when he said: “Of all the 
energetic children of the Devil the London pressman, like 
the journalists of Paris, when the cannon-thunder is in the 
air, is about the worst.” 


Jingo Journalism 

Study the wars of recent times and you will find that, 
preceding their commencement, the press of the countries 
concerned assumes the diabolical duty of spreading misunder- 
standing, jealousy, racial bitterness, envy and hate. Every 
selfish interest, both political and commercial, individual 
and national, concerning which it is possible to foster a fight, 
is appealed to. Political parties whose policies have been 
bitterly attacked are eagerly supported immediately blood- 
shed becomes a plank in their platforms. Statesmen hitherto 
held up for criticism and ridicule are converted at once into 
heroes when they propose to unsheathe the sword. ‘The 


189 


190 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


opposing government, with the ways of the offending peo- 
ple which it represents, is subjected to the wildest mis- 
representation. ‘The vilest reports, cleverly worded so as 
to give them all the support of circumstantial evidence, col- 
ored with all the art of the word painter, are served up for 
every-day consumption. The artist’s provocative sarcasm of 


caricature is made to do its best by ludicrous cartoons which 


present the dignataries, soldiers and common people of the 
enemy’s land in all conceivable attitudes and episodes of dis- 
figurement and silliness. | 

All this idiotic admixture of falsehood, fable and foolery, 
five years after the war is over, is thrown on the junk heap 
of literary fla-fla and imbecility, while decent people won- 
der how it was they could be so hoodwinked by fabulously 
rewarded proprietors and handsomely paid editors; or how 
they could be so befooled by a lot of shallow-brained, bleary- 
eyed, tobacco-smoked, whiskey-soaked young upstarts, who 
run about filling note-books with opinions they’re told long 
before to express and call themselves “The Press.” 


War Slogans and Vengeance 


How often, too, has some slogan, the creation of injured 
pride, become the battle-cry by which the warring battalions 
have been gathered together. How strange such appeals 
should sound in the ears of Christians, whose hearts are 
supposed to be full of a loving spirit of forgiveness. “The 
Day’—‘“Remember the Maine’”—“Avenge Majuba Hill!” 
—‘“Revenge for 1870”—this is the kind of thing that inspires 
and encourages war. Nor is the offspring any better than its 
parentage. If you get a lot of men together for the purpose of 
avenging something or for avenging some one you are as- 
sembling an army of “vengeance.” And what has a Chris- 
tian to do with vengeance? ‘Vengeance is mine!” Mine, 
not yours, “Saith the Lord I will repay.” The Christian 
has absolutely nothing to do with vengeance. Only one 
people were ever justified by God in executing vengeance 


=" 


~ 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 191 


upon others. ‘Those people comprised God’s earthly nation, 
the Jewish nation. “True, God has permitted other nations 
to execute judgments sometimes even upon His own rebel- 
lious people. But it was not His purpose. These “judg- 
ments” were the logical and essential results of their wrong- 
doing. He simply withdrew His protecting hand because 
the wickedness of those He loved made it inevitable that 
He should do so, and the deluge of violence everywhere 
around, long waiting to break through His resistance and 
swallow them up, was allowed to overwhelm them. God 
permits lots of things He never ordains. ‘That is to say, 
He does not always step in to prevent the Devil doing his 
destructive work. This is because the conditions which 
guarantee His interference are not complied with. His 
hands are tied by non-compliance with His eternal laws. 
Where there is disobedience and unbelief the Devil has right- 
of-way. But only one nation, I say, again has ever been di- 
rectly commissioned AS A PEOPLE OF GOD, to act as 
God’s executive for administering vengeance or punishment 
by the sword upon other nations. “That was Israel, over 
whose destinies and battles, as has already been shown, He 
Himself presided. For a Christian to march off with an 
army to “avenge” something is to place himself with a god- 
less mob which is moving in exactly the opposite direction 
to that taken by his Saviour when He went to die on the 
cross rather than resist His persecutors. 

When the scepter departed from Israel and the Church 
_ took her place, revenge for the Christian was deferred till 
the “day of vengeance,” “when the Lord Jesus shall be 
revealed from heaven in flaming fire taking vengeance on 
them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel.’ 
Again and again the Bible refers to ‘“‘the vengeance of the 
LORD”—“The vengeance of His temple’—“To me be- 
longeth vengeance and recompense.’”? ‘“O Lord God, to 
whom vengeance belongeth.”* The Christian’s attitude in 

12 Thess. 1:8. *Deut. 32: 35. °Psa. 94:1. 


192 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


this matter is unmistakably set forth in the words of Paul: 
“Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves; but rather give place 
unto wrath, for it is written, vengeance is mine; I will 
repay, saith the Lord.’ 


Appetite and Character 


If you will tell me what an animal feeds on I will make 


a pretty good guess what sort of a beast or bird it is. I 
know that timothy-grass and hemp-seed feed the sheep and 
the canary, and I know also that a stinking rotten carcass 
feeds the wolf and the vulture. If you will let me see 
where an insect alights or the nature of the thing to which 
it crawls, I will know pretty well the nature of that insect. 
How do I know the difference between a horse-fly and a 
butterfly? I find the butterfly sucking the nectar from the 


flowers, but the horse-fly will be sucking the poison from a> 


festering sore. War feeds on the carrion of, the utterly cor- 
rupt and “‘desperately wicked” heart of unregenerate man— 
that “cage of unclean birds’”—hence war is a dirty business. 
It is the avocation of a man in his nearest approach to the 
snarling, biting beast. Man given over to his “lust” and 
his “desire to have’—‘‘from whence come wars and fight- 


ing.”? “Out of the heart of men proceed . . . murders.’”® 


Devilish Dynamics 


And not only is war inspired by hate but it is executed in 
hate. I defy any military officer in the world to contradict 
me when I say that war can only be carried into effect by 
men whose very souls are aflame with angry animosity. 
When the moment for action comes the dynamics of bestial 
passion, frantic rage, frenzied terror, are just as essential 
to victory as nitro-glycerine and gunpowder are. ‘The men, 
just as much as the guns, have to be primed. ‘The guns 
with gun-cotton, the men with bitterness, revenge and 
ferocity. Sometimes this “priming” is aided by artfully ad- 


1Rom, 12:19. *James 4:1, 2. %Mark 7:21, 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 193 


ministered “dope.” Judging by the descriptions of those 
who have passed through the experience, nothing could 
more nearly resemble the horrors of the bottomless abyss 
than the whirlwind of fury, the storm of oaths, the tempest 
of curses, the shrieks for murder, the hideous yelpings, hoot- 
ings and whoopings which rend the night air when great 
masses of men rush upon each other with the bayonet. It 
is a hell so odious that, rather than enter it, any true Chris- 
tian should enthusiastically welcome the death of a martyr. 

Should any one doubt my words just put yourself in the 
position of a man about to plunge a sword or a bayonet 
deliberately through the lungs or into the bowels of his fel- 
low-man. I appeal to you at least who know something of 
the gracious influences of the Holy Spirit and of the Chris- 
tian religion in your hearts. Aye, I appeal to those cultured 
bishops and ministers whose tenderness of heart would not 
allow them to hurt a kitten—and yet who have been so busy 
putting the bayonet into the hands of the young men of their 
congregations—I address them also when I ask you this 
question: Is it not absolutely the truth to say that YOU 
could never bring yourselves to press that cold steel through 
the raw flesh of a human being unless you were worked 
up into such a passion as would render you either the blind, 
maddened slave of devilish hate, or the subject of ter- 
rorizing fear? 

Impossible! 

A Bayonet Charge! 

As further confirmation of my assertion that rage is essen- 
tial to war, let me read to you the following account of a 
bayonet charge in France as described by Charles Tardieu, 
in the Paris Figaro, and translated for the Philadelphia 
Ledger. Since this report passed the scrutinizing eye of 
the censor, it is doubtless only a modified representation of 
the more ghastly horrors which were constantly happening, 
but which were carefully screened from the public eye. The 
poetry is the translation of a phrase the French soldiers use 


194 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


in describing the notes and “cadence” of the trumpet-call, 
Ss 
“Charge with the bayonet !’’— 


“I know what my neighbors are thinking, but an obstinate ques- 
tion is in my mind. Dare I plunge my bayonet into the body of 
a man, even up to the hilt? That square blade which pierces 
the flesh—a spurt of red, the frightful grimace of a man trans- 
paerced Vi.5)5.". 

“Beneath a tempest of iron with teeth clinched and breast throb- 
bing we hurl ourselves forward. The ranks thin out. The men 
slip down as if they stumbled over a tree root, but none utters a 
cry or raises himself. ‘The wounded fall to the earth without 
moving. I recognize only two or three faces about me, but my 
sharpshooter is always there. He has put his rifle in his bandolier 
and his right hand grips his shears firmly. ‘The last rush has 
carried us nearly to the clearing. Scarcely fifty meters separate 
us from the enemy’s trenches, from which the storm of iron is 
pouring. 

“How can we contain ourselves? The seconds seem like hours. 
We are exasperated, maddened with the desire to fire, to strike, 
to finish it. 

“Suddenly we tremble from head to foot. With a magnificent - 
discord which even brings a smile to our lips, a trumpet sounds 
the charge. Then a formidable cry, ‘Forward! With the bayonets!’ 
repeated from a thousand throats as if mad while the metallic 
notes pierce the heart and rush us on irresistibly—The bugle 
speaks—— 

‘There is a drop to drink above! 
There is a drop to drink!’ 

“Howling like demons no object can check us. Who fails? No 
one knows! 

‘There is a drop to drink above!’ 

“Fallen trees woven together, invisible holes that make us 
tumble, wires which entangle us, these are not enough to check our 
onward rush. . 

‘There is a drop to drink 
. men hurl themselves forward. A corporal gets there first 
and beats the sub-officer down on his own machine-gun. The 
other ‘Coffee Mills’ are seized, too. But the trumpet is not still. 
It sounds. 





“ 
e . 


‘There is a drop to drink above!’ 

“The Westphalians defend themselves courageously. A formid- 
able sergeant of marines, with a gesture quick as thought, plants 
his bayonet in the breast of a big devil, who falls vomiting red 
blood. The blade has penetrated so far that in trying to pull it 
out it is twisted into uselessness. Then there is a horrible melée 
in which the dripping bayonets are plunged into bodies, where 
clubbed rifles beat upon heads where men, each intent on his 
own task, are hurled together, breath to breath, a tangled, biting 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 195 


strangling, kicking mass, from which come oaths and prayers, 
groanings and death-rattles. 

“Two men throw themselves upon each other with so much 
fury that their blades disappear in their bellies even to the hilt. 
They fall side by side with the death-sob in their throats. One 
of the Westphalian officers, still on his feet, hurls himself from 
the wires, but, in his turn, he makes a false step and falls upon 
his adversary. The two men struggle silently, when suddenly 
the soldier, disengaging himself, seizes the officer’s sword and 
pins him to the earth. 

“. , . The few remaining Prussians throw themselves on their 
knees. ‘Comrades!’ they cried, but the fury of carnage was on 
and the bayonets and rifles did their terrible work butchering the 
last with awful groans.” 


I ask you to let these gory facts impress themselves upon 
your minds. ‘This is the glorified “spirit of war” which is 
being trumpeted to the skies by our newspapers and justified 
by so many pulpits all around us today. This is the real 
thing. Not the painted, gilded, fabled, faked, ‘“‘dolled-up”’ 
thing, about which state-ridden preachers wax eloquent when 
they tell their audiences of the “heroism, self-sacrifice and 
undying devotion of those who go to serve their fatherland 
or their king.” Christian mother, I ask you to consider 
that this is the demoniacal affray into which war introduces 
your son and to remember that such infernal butchery would 
be impossible to him unless his very soul were first imbued 
with a spirit the opposite to every moral and Christian 
quality you have sought to instill into him. 


The Ethics of Cat and Dog Fights 


There isn’t much Christian devotion in a dog-fight! 
And I for one will dare to say that the scene depicted by 
this reporter is far worse than a dog-fight, just as much 
worse as man and his powers of mind and heart are greater 
than a terrier or panther. No wild animal could ever hate 
as men can hate. No lion or tiger can inflict such wounds 
as men inflict upon each other, which involve a lingering 
anguish before unconsciousness or death. God has seen to 
that. The claws and fangs of beasts when compared with 
the death instruments of man are implements of mercy, 


196 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


they suspend the terror and agony of slaughter. The rifle 
and the bayonet are constructed, aimed and thrust by a 
diabolical incentive of which even the serpent and the hyena 
are not capable. Yes, war is immoral because it is inspired 
by envy or injured pride, it feeds on vengeance and it is 
executed by the incentive of passion and hate. 


VII. AGAIN, WAR IS IMMORAL BECAUSE IT 
FORCES THOSE TO FIGHT WHO HAVE 
NO REAL QUARREL 


It not only punishes the wrong man, but it punishes him 
for a purely imaginary offense. Ninety per cent. of the 
soldiers who do the fighting have the vaguest possible idea 
of what it is all about. If you were to call on them in- 
dividually to explain the root causes, which are the real 
causes of the strife to defend the justice of their contentions, 
they would not be able to give you any intelligent explana- 
tion. They know that every day they or their comrades are 
killing their fellow-men, but for the life of them they can- 
not give any better reason for doing so than the impression 
they have that their country is in danger and they are called 
to defend it. 


Comrades Who Kill Each Other 


Why it is in danger nine out of ten of them don’t know. 
They have as a rule an utterly mistaken idea of the char- 
acter of those who they go to fight. ‘They have been filled 
up with wicked, false, stupid notions about “the enemy” 
who, in ridiculous newspaper articles, by fire-brand poli-: 
ticians and, not infrequently by Church dignitaries, have been 
described as audacious scoundrels out for plunder or to ruin 
their fatherland. ‘They have been dubbed with degrading 
designations, such as ‘“‘savage Huns” or “bloody Britishers,” 
as the Boers called the red-jacketed Englishman. 

All this is the wildest nonsense. ‘These men who are 
killing each other are in very fact the best of friends. When 
in the last extremity they get heart to heart and death, 
staring them in the face, tears away all this tissue of lies, 
they cry “Comrades!” and that is exactly what they are. 
I am not at this moment speaking of the Christians among 

197 


198 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


them. From a purely worldly standpoint I repeat they 
are, in reality, good friends. ‘That makes it all the more 
criminal, from a Christian viewpoint, that they should kill 
each other. They have every reason to respect and to guard 
their common interests, for they have interests in common. 
They are, as a matter of fact, quite indispensable to one 


another’s welfare. Every day of their lives they have paid. 


each other the compliment of expending hard-earned cash 
for the things they each contribute to the other’s usefulness 
or comfort. ‘They profit by each other’s handiwork. ‘These 
opposing soldiers, who spring to cut each other’s throats, 
have for a long while been wearing the garments their 
“enemies” have woven, or the hats and boots they shaped. 
The pictures, ornaments, trinkets which so enrapture their 
wives and daughters—all these were produced by the fingers 


of those skilled and horny-handed sons of toil who are now 


set in long opposing rows, to blow each other’s brains out. 


War-makers Who Never Fight 


‘These are not the men who make the quarrels, nor those 
who reap any of the advantages. “The diplomats—whose 
political schemes, whose bids for glory, whose love of power, 
so often invite these deluges of blood and tears—they are 
never those who do the fighting or suffer the loss. ‘The 
princes of commerce and finance, the holders of fat stocks 
in great international munition plants, who pile up more 
millions by the innumerable bodies they break and bury with 
their damnable trade—these are not the gentlemen who 
pull up their homes by the roots, kiss their wives and chil- 
dren a last good-by, and go to wallow in mud and blood. 
If the favored few who consider themselves the only parties 
capable of guiding their nation’s destinies would step into 
the battle lines and fight out the quarrels their policies in- 
volve—if the age of military service was fixed between 
forty-five and sixty-five, instead of eighteen and thirty-five, 
there would very quickly be an end of war. Kings, princes, 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 199 


dukes, prime-ministers, chancellors, how so ever clever they 
may be at political intrigue, at parliamentary oratory, are 
not conspicuous personalities in the zones of fire, but they 
are predominantly in evidence among those who have every- 
thing to gain by the game of war. 

The toiling multitudes who are sent to kill each other 
have no particular interest in national quarrels which center 
in such enterprises as the German railway from Berlin to 
Bagdad or the long coveted all British line from Cairo to the 
Cape. The realization of such schemes are certainly not going 
to increase the products of their tiny cabbage-plots or add 
to the scanty wages which flow into their pockets. And 
most decidedly such schemes can never justify Christians in 
going to war with each other. From the Christian stand- 
point, what iniquity could be more monstrous than to incite 
great masses of men to kill each other for a national policy 
which, even were it realized, could never begin to compen- 
sate for the loss of only one eternal spirit. 


VIII. AGAIN, WAR IS IMMORAL BECAUSE IT 
DEMORALIZES THOSE WHO ARE 
ENGAGED IN IT 


When I say demoralization, I don’t mean to imply a 
necessary lapse from those outward and frequently very 
artificial qualifications, regarded as the essentials of “cul- 
ture,’ im. what is called ‘decent society.” Morality is not 
an excellency of speech; good manners, refined and artistic 
tastes, decorated jackets, well-cut trousers, stylish hats, eve- 
ning dress (or un-dress)—morality does not consist in these 
things. Such customs are, as a matter of fact, sometimes 
coverings for the worst kind of immorality. To be a robber. 
one does not need to expose the gains of robbery. To 
prosper by dishonor while concealing dishonesty is the aim 
of every clever thief. It is not the clumsy, slow-witted, 
undisciplined, self-indulgent criminal—the criminal whose 
rude and selfish ways every one recognizes as the habits of 
a low-down man—he is not the most guilty or the most dan- 
gerous. It is the thief disguised as the gentle-mannered, 
considerate, immaculate, sometimes even apparently religious 
gentleman, who is the expert at embezzlement and forgery. 
Besides, in God’s sight, one may be a thief who never yet 
dared to steal in such a way as to reflect upon his much 
boasted “honor.” One may be an adulterer in “his heart” 
who has never yet committed the deed only because the 
things that went with his false reputation were more neces- 
sary to him than the gratification of his appetite. 


Decorated Immorality 
When, then, I say that war demoralizes, I do not mean 
that it degrades all its participants in the sense that it makes 
ill-mannered brutes or disgusting bullies of every one alike. 
200 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 201 


It cannot be denied that with the larger multitude it does 
act in that way. But there are many it influences for evil 
in another manner. I am not quite sure which are most to 
be pitied or which exhibit the greatest moral catastrophe. 
If it is essential that men should engage in the pursuit of 
murder, I am not certain whether, after all, it would not be 
best that they should carry the more objectionable brands of 
that bloody business. For a “dear devoted Christian 
brother,” just because he is called a soldier, to be able to 
come up from a welter of blood in the trenches where, be- 
fore God he has both unlawfully risked his own life and 
taken the lives of others, and complacently justify it all as 
the “sad necessity of war’ evidences, surely, a lower sense 
of moral rectitude than that so often manifested by the 
criminal murderer who, haunted, with the blood of his vic- 
tim, sees him in his dreams and suffers the pangs of outraged 
conscience. It shows how woefully the Christian conscience 
has been made to accommodate itself to the standards of 
falsely called “Christian” nations, and how an apostate 
Church, in order to curry favor with these godless states, 
has brought itself to acquiesce in a code of morals which is 
completely at variance with itself. 

Because, for example, some poor ill-cultured wretch, to 
extricate himself from distress, has poisoned his neighbor to 
get his insurance money, these states will pounce upon him 
with all the terror of the law and hang him as a foul assassin; 
but when those same states, in order to “protect some inter- 
est,’ extend some “imperial policy,” avenge some insult to 
their citizens, or steal some native nation’s territory before 
some other government can grab it—when to do these things 
they send out armies to be killed, and to kill other men like 
cattle, that kind of murder is counted the most worthy sort 
of “valor.” The surviving heroes are marched home, not as 
manacled assassins, but through crowded and decorated 
streets to banquets, where the rotting carcasses of their 
buried brothers of the trenches are forgotten, and where 


202 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


the echoes of their groans are drowned by the flattery of 
admiring women and the effervescent oratory of wily diplo- 
mats. 

Ecclesiasticism and Criminality 


Worst of all, bishops, ministers of the Gosepl, church- 
men of high repute, with surpliced choirs chanting farcical 
praise to God for victories which no one has ever given Him 
an honest chance to achieve, which really belong not to 
Him, but to barbarous instruments in the hands of frantic 
men; all this imposing ecclesiasticism is brought down in 
the endeavor to set the seal of the Almighty’s approval on 
deeds which He abhors and the shame of which cause the 
angels to cover their faces. Looking back over history and 
surveying the rivers of blood spilt for causes which, in their 
time were vigorously advocated by the Church but which to- 
day no one would defend, one feels like saying that the schem- 
ing scoundrel who deliberately plans the murder of his wife, 
buries her in quicklime in the cellar, and then sits in the par- 
lor above complacently enjoying the comforts obtained by 
her money, has not sunk much lower in the moral order 
than the professed Church which can, on so huge a scale, 
break the Sixth Commandment and worry so little about it. 

This is doubtless severe judgment. But I speak as a 
Christian to Christians. These are the most solemn mo- 
ments in the world’s history. “Times when straight words 
are needed, startling and, if you will, cutting, biting words, 
likely to awake slumbering consciences and to send the 
Lord’s people to their Bibles and to their knees. 


The Prejudice of Personal Interest 


That many of us have loved ones connected with armies 
and navies must not blind us to the TRUTH. Here is 
the danger. We are prone to regard this war question, 
like so many others, from the viewpoint of personal inter- 
est—regard for friendship or family affection, We think 
of those we know and love who have been, or are, soldiers. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 203 


We recall the deeds of our kindred on the battle-fields of 
the world. We remember the graves of our antecedents 
who fought to bring us liberty. We reflect on those—very 
few, it must be admitted, but nevertheless some—who read 
their Bibles before they went into battle, and of certain 
generals who, we are told, laid their plans of campaign be- 
fore the Lord. All this inclines us to regard wounding and 
killing, with all the attendent horrors of war, as a kind of 
“privileged” manslaughter. 

But we must remember two things. During the last fifty 
years, while there have been wars which concerned par- 
ticular nations and which have, without doubt, stirred the. 
consciences of God’s people, there has never been a war 
like the recent world conflict. That colossal struggle brought 
the subject before the Church throughout the whole world 
at the same hour with a challenge which can no longer be 
evaded. The forces of militarism are closing in upon us 
and we have got to declare our attitude. Those we love 
and respect in the armies of the world have grown up in 
these times of peace and have never till now been face to 
face as they are today with the real thing in all its ghastly 
awfulness. 

Church and State 

In the second place, we must remember that war has in 
the past been sanctioned by Christians, because they have 
had little light or sound instruction on this matter. It re- 
flects eternal disgrace upon the leaders of Christendom that 
this should have been so, but it is the fact. It is only natural 
that false teaching through the long night of the dark 
ages, by an utterly corrupted hierarchy, concerning the 
alliance of Church and State—the propagation of the Gospel 
by the sword—should cling to professing Christians today. 
But as the end of this age approaches God has wonderfully 
re-opened the Bible to His true people, and light on this, 
as on other fearfully neglected truths, has been sweeping 


_ 


204 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


through the world. ‘Those of us who see it must not, on 
peril of our souls, shrink from letting it shine. As I have 
said elsewhere: 


“For the follower of Christ, and let it be well observed we are 
speaking only to him, bloodshedding in the twentieth century is 
surely a more serious proposition than it has been in any preced- 
ing age. While even today there is an appaling lack of proper 
teaching on this subject, so that most Christians have been brought 
to believe that ‘God and Country’ are almost synonomous terms, 
and that to fight, therefore, for one’s country, even though it might 
be in the wrong, was commendable to God, yet many things have 
transpired during the last half century to awaken the true fol- 
lower of Christ to the real character of war. ‘The remarkable 
advance in Bible study, by which multitudes have been led to 
understand the vital importance of the dispensational teachings of 
the Scriptures, has accomplished wonders in this direction.” 


There is, therefore, every reason for great care in judging 
those who have not had the privilege of this teaching. As 
regards thousands of Christians in the armies of Europe, 
the red carnage of the late war and the antagonism of the 
spirit of battle to the spirit and example of the Saviour 
has brought them to see what so many of their leaders have 
so miserably failed to show them. 

But all this never alters the fact that, though it may be 
unconsciously, war has had and is having a demoralizing 
effect on even sincere Christians. How many a bright 
young follower of Christ has fallen before the temptations 
of the barrack-room, or suffered complete extinction of 
spiritual life through the stifling antichristian atmosphere 
which pervades the trenches. It is sad but it is true, 


AWFULLY TRUE. 


War’s Fatal Reaction 


As for the effects of war on the average soldier, the fol- 
lowing tragic words of Baron D’Estournelles de Constant, 
written in a French publication entitled La Paix par le 
Droit, gives some idea: 


“I daily see soldiers coming home on leave from the front; 
they talk to me without restraint or affectation. ... Those who 
return after a year’s warfare do not boast or complain. They 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 205 


leave again with less emotion than they showed when leaving 
for the first time. They know where they are going ... I can- 
not tell you with what grief I watch this sinister education of 
men coming back transformed. I will not say that they have 
actually become wicked; but it is something much worse; they 
have grown accustomed to do evil unconsciously, to give the lie 
to all their lives, all that they believed, all that they desired 
hitherto. To kill has become their duty, their sole object and 
purpose of life. Suffering does not touch them; what formerly 
upset them now leaves them cold. How many a fine young lad 
who would not have hurt a fly is ashamed now to say that at the 
commencement he wept at the idea of having to strike a human 
being; to kill, to kill again and yet again, under pain of being 
killed and more than killed—conquered, enslaved... . 

““What would you? One said to me with a resigned smile, 
‘One gets used to everything. At first I could not listen to wounded 
comrades piercing the heavens with their cries, the older ones 
calling on their wives and the children, the young ones crying 
“Mother!” and now beside one who weeps, the others are sing- 
ing. We live in the midst of men dying, and dead bodies in a 
state of decay.’ 

“All the soldiers, even the best, have spoken to me in a like 
manner, and it cannot be otherwise. Their hearts are hardened; 
moral reaction takes place in the same proportion as scientific 
progress discovers new means of killing and causing destruction.” 


Bloody Hands and Stony Hearts 


If it is not an idle fiction, that conduct bears a vital rela- 
tionship to character, then it is impossible for men with 
hearts and consciences to do the kind of thing required of 
them in battle and not be morally affected by it. How can 
a man deliberately look along the sight of his rifle and take 
aim at his brother-men with the definite intent of taking his 
life without smothering every instinct of pity and justice? 
How can a man crouch for hours in the dark, or lie con- 
cealed behind tree-stumps or hedgerows, waiting with hands 
filled with deadly bombs or grenades, to fling upon unsus- 
pecting brother-men—how can he lie there, like a fox trap- 
ping a chicken or a panther waiting its prey, without feel- 
ing just what he is—a sneak. ‘There isn’t anything par- 
ticularly “heroic” in the way a cat catches a mouse! But 


206 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


in this sneak-murder, the soldier is on a level with his cat or 
the fox at the door of his hen-coop. 

And when he isn’t sneaking like the fox, he is springing 
like the panther. No man can go on murdering without 
getting the murderer’s instinct. No man can creep about after 
other men in the dark and lie “like a trooper” in the light, 
and retain his fine sense of honor. No man can stand at a 
machine and cut down with a scythe of bullets row after 
row of men—see them fall, hear their screech of agony, 
and ever again have the same respect for human life which 
possessed him when he left wife and children at the door 
of his home. Absolutely IMPOSSIBLE! | 

I shall never forget the cold-blooded way in which a 
prominent Boer with whom I rode on a train in South 
Africa told me of the number of Englishmen he had killed. 
He seemed to distinguish very little between the soldiers he 
had shot and the springbok he had just been out shooting. 

It is a well-established fact that men whose grim pro- 
fession is in the slaughter-house, whose hands are always 
blood-stained, whose gaze rests eternally on the death agony 
—the piteous pleading in the eyes of expiring beasts—become 
hardened, they lose their sensitiveness of spirit, and so are 
disqualified for correct adjudication concerning the finer 
distinction between right and wrong. For this reason, 
under the British constitution, such men are debarred from 
taking office as judges. 


Warriors and Women 


As to the honor of women, that infallible test of both in- 
dividual and national character, it must, alas! be said that 
militarism and the degradation of womanhood are, and 
always have been, appallingly linked together. It is admitted 
that such a conjunction is inevitable. When prominent 
military experts, high officials and even statesmen come for- 
ward to defend such filthy legislation as the Contagious Dis- 
eases Act for India, there is afforded all-sufficient evidence 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 207 


of the immorality of armies. Such legislation is defended 
on the grounds of “painful necessity.”’ “It is shameful, but 
it is, nevertheless, unavoidable,’ say these advocates of a sys- 
tem which they spare no effort to assure us is the certain way 
of making heroes and warriors of our young men. “If,” 
they continue, “certain results are bound to happen and to 
continue to happen every time a regiment marches into a 
city and while it remains there, it is better for the men— 
for the MEN (mark how little concern these ‘‘valiant”’ 
gentlemen appear to manifest for the daughters of the poor 
whose degradation they wink at)—“‘it is better,” they say, 
“that these indulgences, it is safer and more wholesome for 
the MEN, that these transgressions against God’s laws and 
the virtue of women should be committed under proper con- 
ditions, and that our gallant soldiers should be guarded 
against certain contingencies which might prove as disadvan- 
tageous to our armies as they have proved to the native races 
it has been our duty to fight and to whom we have intro- 
duced our vices.” And so “covered with glory” and pro- 
tected by those modern “indulgences” which nowadays take 
the form of “licenses” and “medical certificates,” the ma- 
jority of soldiers go their way in times of peace plagueing gar- 
rison cities with a scourge of immorality, and during war- 
time spreading a deluge of lust wherever they get an oppor- 
tunity. It is mot nice, of course, to say such things about 
the men who are supposed to be the unselfish and manly 
“defenders of our wives and daughters,” but it is God’s 
truth, as anybody who knows anything about war and gar- 
rison towns—and has no cause for lying—will tell you. 


I have no time to speak about barrack life and the conse- 
quences of hoarding masses of red blooded men together 
without the purifying influences of wives, sisters and sweet- 
hearts or women in general ;—the less said the purer the at- 
mosphere! Never let it be forgotten that there are many 
noble exceptions. But I speak of the rule. 


208 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Impurity the Doom of Nations 


Concerning this aspect of the moral question, the recent 
struggle has shown us, not only war’s degenerating influence 
on individual men, but on nations as a whole. ‘There has 
been a universal “winking” at vice and the breach of vital 
laws, the upholding of which are of infinitely greater im- 
portance to a people than the flag under which they live or 
the achievement of ultimate political or racial triumph. 
Judged by the Christian standard, this is a momentous 
truth. Germany under the British Government or England, 
or America under the rule of Germany, unthinkably dis- 
tasteful to either nation as such a contingency might be, is 
a small matter compared with a lowering of those barriers 
of morality which, under the hand of a merciful God, have 
held back those sinister forces of licentiousness and villainy 
ever the undoing of all great empires in the past. Babylon, 
Persia, Greece, Rome, these were not so much conquered by 
outward foes—they wasted away through internal rotten- 
ness. It was the physical decomposition which so rapidly 
follows after moral death which destroyed those empires. 


Prussianism and Parisianism 


In this connection it will be well for us to remember that 
France, our recent ally, whose praises, just because she is a 
republic, have been trumpeted to the skies by Church digni- 
taries while, at the same time, they never cease to thunder 
at the vices with which she has flooded the world—France, 
has at this moment far more to fear from immorality and 
race suicide than she has from Germany. For the past fifty 
years this has been the dread evil which has been surely 
wasting her very vitals. According to Paul Deschanel—a 
president of the French Chamber of Deputies, Germany has 
during the last forty-four years added to her population by 
natural birth twenty-five millions, while France in the same 
period has added a meager three millions. In 1850, France 
was the largest nation in Europe, she is now in the seventh 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 209 


rank! At the end of the present century she will hardly 
number twenty millions! Professor Levy, one of the most 
eminent of French economists, tells us that if France had 
kept her bith-rate equal to that of Germany’s since 1870, 
she would have had, when the last war broke out, a 
population of sixty-five or seventy millions. He tells us 
also that in the year 1910, the French population remained 
stationary, while in that same year Germany added nearly 
eight hundred thousand to her people. ‘The war seems to 
have awakened France to these facts, and she has been 
swinging to the opposite extreme. Babies and their mothers, 
by the thousands, have been taken over and supported by the 
state. Offspring from women of any and every class has been 
received and paid for with grateful appreciation, no ques- 
tions being asked about the fathers of the same. Multitudes 
of these “fathers” were British “heroes,” whose concern either 
for France or their French-born progeny was a very small 
consideration alongside the gratification of their lusts. After 
all, then, France has much more to fear from her women, 
with all their damning devices for race suicide, than she has 
from Germany. Prussianism which kills on the battle- 
field is no worse than Parisianism which destroys in the 
womb. 

Woman, both as regards her estimation of her own duty 
and calling, and as regards her relationship to her con- 
sort and protector man—the character of women and the 
treatment of womanhood, I say, has always marked the glory 
or indicated the doom of great nations. 

Any institution, any practice, therefore, which degrades 
womanhood, belittles motherhood, or depraves girlhood must 
be highly dangerous for a nation and absolutely forbidden 
for the Church. War does all this. It has always done it. 
For every single woman it has protected, it has brought a 
hundred other women dishonor or death. Victorious armies 
have ever left in their wake the black ruin of licentiousness 
and debauchery. 


210 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Constitutionalizing Bestiality 


The last war lowered the standard of woman’s honor and 
virtue as no war ever did. It did it all the more effectively 
because under its sheltering license and encouraged by a 
quiet acquiescence on the Church’s part, events transpired, 
aye, even legislation was enacted which before the commence- | 
ment of that conflict, would have so shocked the public 
conscience as to raise a shriek of protest to the very heavens. 
In the paralyzing grip of fear that nations might go under 
for want of men to take the places of the sons offered for 
cannon-fodder, the moral restraints which have hitherto con- 
tributed to the sanctity of English and German homes, not 
to mention others, were flung to the winds. Under the 
impression that their kith and kin would look with tolerance 
upon acts which, though shameful would assist their country, 
tens of thousands of boys, reared in workmen’s homes, villas 
and mansions, where the modesty of mothers and sisters had 
cast a halo of sanctity about the gentler sex, went down 
before the demon of lust, and can never look upon a woman 
quite in the same way again. 

As an evidence of how war has always brought about this 
immorality and its dire results among soldiers let me mention 
the staggering figures quoted by Dr. M. J. Exner in an 
article reviewed by the Literary Digest of September 15, 
1917. He states that among the American army in the 
Philippines the percentage of soldiers suffering from venereal 
diseases rose to more than 301 per thousand and was several 
times greater than any other malady. He tells us that the 
ravages of vice in all the European armies during the late 
war have been nothing less than frightful. At the end of the 
first year of the war one of the Great Powers had more men 
incapacitated by venereal disease than by all the fighting at 
the front. In 1916 the medical staff of that country said 
that there were seventeen thousand cases of venereal disease 
contracted in a single camp. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 211 


The New York Press recently startled the United States 
by an appalling statement concerning the young men of 
this country—the pick and pride of the nation—who were 
herded together under the sinister spell of war. Mrs. 
Humiston, the plucky and clever woman detective of the 
Metropolitan Police Force, came out with the amazing as- 
sertion that within a few weeks six hundred girls were expec- 
tant mothers on account of the immoral attentions of the 
soldiers of one camp alone! Mrs. Humiston, who was 
promptly deprived of her license for this statement, has a 
way of proving her assertions, 


Breeding Soldiers 


Worse, still, tens of thousands of innocent girls who before 
that war were hardly guilty of an act approaching to im- 
propriety, yielded themselves, in this wild delirium of 
“patriotism,” as little better than animals for breeding 
soldiers and tasted the deepest shame a woman can know. 
Hence, these war torn nations are filled with ‘“war-brides” 
and “‘war-babies” whose “husbands” and fathers are ashamed 
to show their faces, and for whose assistance, as I have shown, 
government schemes of patronage and support are unblush- 
ingly proposed. If this is not demoralization, then the 
Devil’s work has taken on a saintly complexion. 


Such comments as the following from prominent and 
capable public women are in themselves a sufficiently damn- 
ing indictment of war as a demoralizing agency. Mrs. 
Archibald Colquhoun, writing in the Contemporary Review, 
said: 

“The stern moralist must reflect that a country which depends 
on emotional appeal to raise its army, and then having secured the 
flower of its manhood by such appeal, sends them to train for six 
months or so, far from their homes and among admiring women, 
must expect certain consequences. ‘The consequences are coming 
in their thousands, and ought in the interests of the nations and 
in justice to our fighting men to be provided for. These, after all, 
are the outcome of very different circumstances and emotions from 


212 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


the sordid stories of the slums and crowded streets which pre- 
face many illegitimate births.” 

This good lady appears to have a very extraordinary stand- 
ard for measuring moral actions. One would have thought 
that, judged from every possible gauge of justice, sexual 
indulgence in a slum attic, where eight people of both sexes 
are huddled together, and which resulted in an illegitimate 
birth, was a thousand times more excusable than such indul- 
gences when they are the acts of a great nation’s army com- 
posed of ‘‘the flower of its manhood”—men who, by com- 
parison, are very well cared for, well fed, well housed, well 
groomed, well disciplined, pretty well paid, and far better 
informed than the denizens of ‘darkest England” or Amer- 
ican slumdom. But no, these men who, at such “self- 
sacrifice,” have ‘“‘sprung to the rescue of their country” are 
excused on the ground that they are “far from home’— 
that their “emotions” have been appealed to—and we are 
thus led to regard with tolerance “certain consequences 
which must be expected.” More, we are told that “in jus- 
tice to our fighting men” the babes those “heroes” have 
brought into the world, and who, of course, they will never 
recognize as their offspring, must be provided for out of 
state exchequers, while the helpless little creatures wailing 
at the breasts of milkless mothers, in sunless hovels, are the 
subjects of “the sordid stories of the slums” and must be 
left to the cold mercy of poor-houses or the scanty doles of 
charity. 

Could anything more completely show the demoralizing 
effect of militarism than this? 


The Degradation of Motherhood 


But this good lady goes on, as if suddenly startled at what 
might be the logical consequences of her astounding argu- 
ment: 

“At the same time woman, as a sex, will be badly served if 
ill-judged sentimentalism elevates these ‘war mothers’ into her- 
oines. If marriage is to retain any place in our social system, 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 213 


public opinion must continue to make the position of an unmar- 
ried mother inferior to that of a wife.” 

Madame Colquhoun should remember that it is not “pub- 
lic opinion,’ which has insured the sacredness of the wife 
and the mother, but God’s everlasting law, and that if im- 
mense armies cannot exist without calling forth such justi- 
fication of gross immorality as she would seem to condone, 
then ‘“‘public opinion” will soon drop to the level of the mili- 
tary standard, when nothing can prevent a tide of lust from 
sweeping away the barriers of wedlock and debasing the all 
but divine office of wife and mother to the level of a harlot 
or a concubine. 

When so esteemed a lady as the Countess of Warwick 
feels herself constrained to plead for “the abolition of a 
penalty upon the man who marries his unmarried wife,” 
things, from a moral standpoint, must have become serious 
indeed. Nothing but war could ever induce such a champion 
of woman’s honor to say anything approaching such an 
utterance. So much the worse for war. 

In a war-time number of The Current Opinion I find the 
following: 


“The moral laxity consequent to war in all the fighting nations 
does not escape the attention of American newspapers. ‘They note 
that Germany not only encouraged soldiers to take war-brides for 
the sake of the race before going into war, but that government 
provision has been made for German rearing of children born in 
the wake of the conquering army, as well as medical care for the 
voluntary or involuntary mothers. Reports from France assert 
that in these war times the state practically does away with ille- 
gitimacy; war benefits go alike to married and unmarried mothers; 
foundling boxes are said to have been restored in churches; and 
special provisions for children born of enemy soldier-fathers as 
state foundlings have been inaugurated to relieve burdened 
mothers. Alleged connivance of authorities at English training 
camps in excesses of the soldiers, recalled traditional provisions 
formally made for English soldiers when on foreign soil.” 

Jane Adams wrote recently: 

“At the present moment women in Europe are being told: ‘Bring 
children into the world for the benefit of the nation; for the 
strengthening of future battle lines; forget everything that you 
have been taught to hold dear; forget your long struggle to estab- 


214 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


lish the responsibilities of fatherhood; forget all but the appetite 
of war for human flesh. It must be satisfied and you must be the 
ones to feed it, cost what it may.’ This is war’s message to the 
world of women.” 


After this, nothing more concerning war’s wide open invi- 
tation to sexual immorality needs to be said. 


Conduct and Character 
But there is another kind of immorality which calls for a 
word or two. We have already said something about the 
gruesome nature of the weapons of war. During the last 
great struggle where did they come from? Who made them? 
The daily papers, in full-page war reports, sent by skilled 
reporters, spared no pains to describe in lurid language the 
ghastly effects of those shells, bombs, bullets and destructive 
machines. The people read those reports, they knew how at 
a certain moment, in some unmentioned place, a shell crashed 
into a trench and scattered the heads, arms, legs, brains, 
hands, entrails of a dozen men in horrible intermixture— 
some down into mud, some up through the air. But who 
made these shells? Why, the people who read these reports 
made them. ‘They knew what they did while they made 
them. They actually talked about such horrors to each other 
with smiles and oaths. Not only men did this, that would 
have been bad enough, but women did it—women whose 
hearts a little while before were tender and sweet; women 
who were made to love and be loved; women with husbands, 
sons, lovers, some of whom had already been lost to them by 
means of exactly such cruel instruments as they were then 
constructing. ‘Think of it, women—zwomen, day after day, 
deliberately shaping cones, filling them with deadly ingre- 
dients, and adjusting the merciless fuse. Women did all this 
to kill other women’s husbands and sons and to break the 
hearts of other women. And they did it all for money. For 
big money—for blood money. How can men and women do 
all this and not suffer in their moral make-up ? 
If they could have walked over the battle-fields watching 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 215 


those shells do their horrible work, if they could have seen 
the torture they inflicted, if they could have heard wounded 
men crying through the night, as they felt for the bullet in 
the festering sore—crying for home, for wife, for little 
ones—crying for one touch of “mother’s hand”—do you 
think they could have gone on making those things? Before 
the war I would have said impossible! But after I am 
afraid I would have had to say I think they could almost 
have done it. Their consciences were chloroformed by the 
speeches of “Christian” statesmen, aye “Christian” ministers. 
They had been told that by making these things they rendered 
loyal service to their country, that this was the best way of 
serving Christ. In a way they came to believe it. At first 
they shrank from it as a bloody business. And so it was. 
But their work had a demoralizing influence on their 
characters. 


Troubled Consciences 

Judged by the law of Christ the munition trade is im- 
moral. Murder must always be immoral. I question, there- 
fore, if the thousands who have toiled so hard, and taken 
such splendid pay to manufacture these instruments of ruin, 
will ever be quite the same self-respecting working men and 
women they once were. Magazine writers exalt the women 
of England and Germany as the saviours of their countries, 
but what shall it profit a woman if she save her country 
and lose her soul? What the Psalmist said of the Israel- 
ites who made and worshipped idols may be said to all such 
workers who make and rely on munitions, “They that make 
them are like unto them, so is every one that trusteth in 
them.’ 

Among the Christians who work in this ghastly indus- 
try there have been many troubled consciences. And well 
there may be, for only true repentance and much faith in the 
blood of Christ will ever suffice to wash from their hands the 


1Psa, 115:8. 


216 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


stains of their brother’s blood. For Christians, whose mission 
in the world is one of peace and good-will, who are respon- 
sible for scattering the glad tidings of the Gospel—for them 
to be laboring with feverish activity at the construction of 
fiendish weapons which they know will certainly end the pro- 
bation of many thousands of Christless souls, is surely an 
awful misappropriation of their energies. Christians, in this 
hour of the world’s midnight, forewarned of their Master to 
lift up their heads from the midst of warring nations, from 
appalling iniquity, and look for their “redemption,” which 
“draweth nigh’!—Christians at “such a time as this” to be 
throwing their Bibles on to the junk-heap of the world’s 
fiction, and centering their hopes in shot and shell—tt is too 
appalling for words! But it is war which makes all this 
possible. ‘The wild delirium of war will befog and befool 
even the Church of God. 


War is therefore immoral. 


1Luke 21:25, 28. 


PART IV 


WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE, FOR 
THE CHRISTIAN, IT IS UNPATRIOTIC 





WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE FOR THE 
CHRISTIAN, IT IS UNPATRIOTIC 


WHAT is patriotism? 

This is the question for these times of quivering excite- 
ment, amid these shoutings for “Fatherland,” for “King,” 
for “Country; amid these huge demonstrations where 
orators “breathe out threatenings and slaughter,’ where 
great masses of men stand up and scream “Deutschland tber 
alles,’ ‘Rule Britannia,” the ‘‘Marseillaise’ or “Yankee 
Doodle,” waving flags and working themselves up into wild 
frenzy, by means of which they are gotten—while knowing 
next to nothing of the facts—to “vote unanimously and by 
acclamation” for each other’s slaughter. 

Is this patriotism? 

What is patriotism? ‘This is the interrogation we need 
to keep before us, while listening to expressions of arrogant 
national egoism which fall from the lips of kings and states- 
men, in the high places, about the things that have been 
done, are yet to be done, by the superiority of English blood, 
German blood, French blood, Austrian blood, Italian blood 
or American blood while at the same time (and this, to those 
whose eyes are on the truer indicators of history, is a thing 
of no small significance) not a word is ever said about the 
past achievements, the future prospects, of Jewish blood— 
the blood which, from the national viewpoint, is the blood 
par excellence in God’s sight—do all these great swelling 
words, spoken from under crowns, behind glittering regalia, 
from presidential chairs, constitute patriotism? 


Alternate Kissing and Kicking 
What is patriotism? Let us keep this query well in mind 
and resolve to get down to realities as we glance backward 
219 


220 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


and note its extraordinary display in history. An erratic, an 
altogether unstable thing, is this “patriotism” of the world. 
Its manifestations of love and hatred are surprising to a de- 
gree. The rapidity with with which it changes from effusive 
friendship today into blazing hot animosity tomorrow, is 
‘astounding. At one time the “patriots” have nothing for 
their neighbor state but kisses, at another, nothing but kicks. 
Back yonder toward the evening of bloody Waterloo, we 
hear Wellington, in death-grips with Napoleon and his 
French armies, praying devoutly that Blucher may hurry 
to his help and, ere the sun goes down, we see Briton and 
Prussian welded in battle and exultant over their common 
foe—even France. Yesterday Frenchman and Englishmen 
were united in a “patriotism” which sought eagerly the com- 
plete humiliation of England’s former friend, then regarded 
as the accursed Hun! Today France is turning bitter because 
of England’s consideration of stricken Germany. 

Not long ago the “patriotism” of London and Paris mani- 
fested itself at Balaclava and Inkerman, where English and 
French troops were flying at the throats of Russian soldiers ; 
whereas but yesterday, Russian, generals and admirals were 
received with hilarious delight in the cities of England and 
France, where applauding multitudes crowded the streets to 
see them pass, and extragavant banquets, with after-dinner 
speeches, champagne and other effervescences were arranged 
for their féteing. "Today these nations are again foes of 
Russia. 

For three decades it was the highest British “patriotism,” 
to flirt with the accursed Turk in order to keep the Darda- 
nelles closed to the fleets of Russia; but yesterday some of 
the best regiments in the English and Australian armies were 
buried on the gory slopes of Gallipoli to smash the Turk and 
let the Russians through. Today the “allies” have re- 
enthroned the Turk in Constantinople. 

For nearly a hundred years it was patriotism of the best 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 221 


order for each of the states now comprising the German 
Empire to foster the fiercest hatred for each other. 

As occasion served, the Saxons flew at the throats of the 
Hessians. Soldiers of the Palatinate wrestled with Han- 
overians; the traditional policy of Bavaria had ever been to 
fight Prussia to the last gasp; but expressions of such senti- 
ment today, by any of the peoples comprising the German 
Confederacy, would be the most accursed disloyalty. Ba- 
varia, whose long practiced. diplomacy had been to depend 
on the protection of French kings, actually sent her ruler 
in 1871 to propose the crowning of William of Prussia, as 
the Emperor of United Germany; and this he did, in the 
Palace of Versailles, at the moment when France, his long 
trusted ally, lay prostrate at the feet of Prussia, both his and 
her historic foe. 

Is this patriotism? 


Shooting and Boosting 

‘Twenty-five years ago all the British Empire was inflamed 
to the fiercest pitch of ‘“‘patriotic’” fervor over the South 
African War. Any one daring to say a word in favor of the 
little Dutch republics was dubbed a “traitor.” It was a 
“patriotism” which evidenced itself in the smashing, on ac- 
count of his “pro-Boer’’ sympathies, of Mr. Lloyd George’s 
windows and stalked with an unpoarious and drunken im- 
becility through London on “Mafeking night.” ‘Today the 
scepter of power from Cape Town to Pretoria has, for all 
practical purposes, passed into the hands of the very men who 
fought England, who slaughtered the British troops at 
Majuba Hill and Spion Kop, while we have seen the late 
commander-in-chief of the British armies in South Africa— 
formerly the leader of the Boers against the British—turn 
upon his German friends, to be welcomed to Downing Street 
as one of the heroic councillors of the British Empire! 
Nowadays it would be highly “unpatriotic” to speak one dis- 
paraging word against “His Majesty’s Government at Cape 


222 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


+B] 


Town,” though some of it is composed of the same men 
about whom no slander was too vile or ridiculous for pub- 
lication, when the “‘soldiers of the Queen”’ sailed away from 
England to shoot them down. 

For half a century or more it has been the most ardent 
“patriotism” for the Briton to curse the rising menace of 
Prussian militarism, while singing lustily the praises of the 
ever-increasing might of the British navy. “Britannia 
rules the waves” —‘“The pennants which fly from the flag- 
ships of English admirals lash the seas of both hemispheres” 
—“The guns of England keep ward and watch over the 
gate-ways of the ocean’”—‘Upon the white ensign of the 
British Admiralty, or the folds of the Union Jack, the sun 
never sets’—‘‘John Bull must never let slip his control of 
the seas’—“Nothing of any importance can ever be done 
without our permission,” these are the cries which have filled 
the mouths of men whose “patriotism” consigns the German 
nation to the nethermost perdition, for having said exactly 
the same things about her army. For it was German “patriot- 
ism’’—every bit as justifiable in them as in us—which insisted 
that her “mailed fist” should become and should remain 
supreme in Europe. By her armies she hoped to arrive at the 
place of pre-eminence which England had already reached by 
her navy—the place where no political decision should be 
arrived at, no world-policy concerning commerce or territory 
put into effect, without her knowledge and her sanction. So 
we see the “patriotism” of London is rank poison in Berlin 
just as the “patriotism” of Berlin was hell-fire treason in 
London. And yet they are precisely the same thing. 

Is this patriotism ? 


Democracy and the House of Lords : 

Since the war of the American Revolution, it has been the — 
fashion throughout the United States every Fourth of July, 
for her people to break into ecstasies of exultation over the 
“freedom” obtained from the supposed “tyranny” of British 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 223 


dominance. The teaching of the school-books of this land 
have indelibly impressed on the mind of the average child 
over here the idea that England and oppression in some way 
go together. No American boy fires off his crackers without 
reawakening the memory of that much admired explosion 
of wrath, which, in the breast of George Washington, tore 
down the Union Jack to hoist the Star Spangled Banner. 
The very terms of American citizenship papers lead to the 
conclusion that loyalty to England is the quality, above all 
others, that should be eschewed by the good “patriot” of the 
United States. 

And never was this sentiment more emphasized than dur- 
ing the days when the gigantic might of Britain was, largely 
at the dictate of financial magnates, stamping out the in- 
dependence of the little Boer republics. To express these 
opinions and to denounce all who protested against them as 
“pro-British” was, for the American citizen, “patriotism” 
of a superlative degree. 

Yet a few years ago when, with Reni Viviani, late premier 
of the French nation (who, by the way, moved a resolution 
in the French Chamber of Deputies, that France should no 
longer recognize the existence of God, and who introduced 
legislation which confiscated the property of the Catholic 
Church, turning thousands of nuns into the streets), when, 
accompanied by this gentleman, the Right Hon. Arthur 
Balfour, now Lord Balfour, late premier of England, who 

during the previous thirty years—so the Liberal Party leaders 
told us—stood as the defender of the intolerable selfishness 
of the blue-blooded land proprietors of the House of Lords; 
who, they declared, had obstructed almost every great pro- 
posal for liberal legislation brought forward in the House 
of Commons for a quarter of a century; who was the prime 
mover and engineer of the South African campaign, with all 
its horrors of civilian “concentration camps,” blazing home- 
Steads and importation of Chinese labor; whose manage- 
ment of British affairs David Lloyd George had exhausted 


224 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


the vocabulary of parliamentry language to denounce— 
when this gentleman comes over to this great “democracy,” 
so sudden and complete was the somersault of American 
“patriotism,” that he was hailed as one of the saviours of the 
world, he was taken to the tomb of Washington to flatter the 
hero his forefathers fought—even as their descendants are 
fighting, when they dare, all such heroes today—and he was 
honored as the representative of a “royal monarch,” by a 
great gathering of republican statesmen and citizens, who 
joined their voices in lustily singing “God save the King.” 
Is this patriotism? 


The Fatal Imbecility of Pride 

Truly a very topsy-turvy, tipsy sort of somersaulting 
thing is this much-trumpeted quality called “patriotism.” 
That is, of course, what the world calls “patriotism.” But 
the world knows little about the real commodity. It is not 
possible that worldly men should know much about it because 
worldly men are essentially proud, self-centered, and nations 
which are, for the most part, made up of such men are even 
more arrogant and selfish. On reflection it will be found 
that these two qualities, pride and selfishness, are funda- 
mental essentials of the “patriotism” of all earthly kingdoms. 
Pride, in the first place, is largely responsible for the dili- 
gence with which governments seek to instil into their sub- 
jects the notion of their national superiority. Hence, the 
national displays, feastings, celebrations, reviewing of troops 
dolled up in all kinds of gaudy and senseless uniforms; as- 
sembling of costly dreadnaughts which emit smoke and make 
a ridiculous noise; inflammable speeches at national con- 
ventions full of oratorical, shallow phrases, which seek to 
exalt the speaker’s nation above all others—all this fooling 
and deluding of the common people, by whose permission 
armies and navies exist, and who endure nearly all the suf- 
fering and do most of the killing, all this has its root in 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 225 


pride. And pride is that loathsome sin which, more than 
any other, stinks in the nostrils of God. 

Nor could such appeals to the people succeed for one mo- 
ment, were it not for this latent vanity in the hearts of all 
men through sin: the vanity which feeds on national swag- 
geration; that likes to look, often out of individual little- 
ness or worthlessness, upon the altogether exaggerated pic- 
ture, painted by itself or others, of its national superiority, 
its supposed omnipotence; which, while singing the praises 
of its own “fatherland,” minimizes the deeds of which other 
“fatherlands” have a similar disposition to feel proud. 


The Tyranny of Selfishness 


So it comes to pass that the toiling masses who along all 
history have borne the burden of war’s horrors; who have 
lost at one stroke their homes and bits of treasures; whose 
antecedents have gone down by millions into early graves, 
over which unnumbered hearts have been broken and rivers 
of tears have been shed; these people, because of this deceitful 
pride hidden in their breasts, will, when that pride is ap- 
pealed to, come out in thousands; shout hurrahs for those 
who lead them to ruin; shower wild oaths upon the unoffend- 
ing peoples of other nations; drink themselves tipsy to the 
health of kaisers, kings, queens, presidents ; clap their hands 
as soldiers and sailors march by; stand erect with pomp when 
they hear the imagined “greatness” of their nations expressed 
in the boom of big guns or the clash of brass bands; spend 
their hard-earned pennies in letting off crackers; exhaust 
their energy in the frantic waving of flags; and yell them- 
selves hoarse screaming, “Long live Germany !’”—“Long 
live Russia!”—‘‘God save the King’”—“Vive la France” 
—‘America forever!”—and THIS is called patriotism ! 

But selfishness is also at the root of this worldly “‘patri- 
otism.” The only thing to which these nations are constant, 
are ever faithful, is their own welfare. They go in the di- 
rection in which this is to be gained. Their “patriotism” is 


226 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


a persistent and consistent loyalty to themselves. ‘Their 
neighbor nations are friends today or foes tomorrow exactly 
as they think they will help or hinder in realizing their 
schemes or policies. Worldly citizens will always stand for 
their country’s interests, which of course, nine times out of 
ten, means a blind subservience to the dictatorship of a small 
coterie of statesmen who preside over these “interests,” 
sometimes create them, and always define them. ‘The 
“patriotism” of all such people is aptly expressed in that ex- 
ceedingly immoral sentence of Stephen Decatur, impudently 
intruded by the Chicago Daily Tribune every morning upon 
the gaze of its readers: “Our country in her interests with 
foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our 
country, right or wrong.” 


The Birthplace of Godless Patriotism 


There is yet another characteristic of this earthly god- 
less “patriotism,” which must be noticed if we are to be 
thoroughly honest and fearless. The truest “patriotism’’ is 
not that which is manifested by the newer countries, whose 
peoples comprise many nationalities held together by a com- 
mon material interest. It is an instinct in the blood. 
Whence then came this racial animosity between man and 
his brother man? Let us look at that for a moment. Unless 
there has been some extraneous ingrafting wrought by some 
higher power, you may always tell the character of the fruit 
by the nature of the root. What is the root of this national 
spirit which men, aye even Christians, make so much boast 
of? Was it God’s original intent that man should bar 
and bridge himself off into races and communities whose 
quarreling and cruelty toward each other should fill the 
earth with blood-stains and misery? ‘To put the question 
is to answer it, for God’s very nature forbids such a supposi- 
tion. 

This racial distinction and its consequent antagonism 
sprang out of wickedness and pride. Away back across the 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 227 


centuries Satan’s strategy in Eden had been successfully 
repeated, and man, while in arrogant defiance of Jehovah, 
was being induced to climb to heaven, even as he is today, 
by the might of his own right arm—by the contrivance of 
his own cunning. “There was some strange and awful sig- 
nificance in that enterprise back there. ‘To prevent an even 
greater disaster God came down to the Tower of Babel, 
just as He did when He expelled Adam from the tree of 
life, and cut short the operations of those conspirators against 
His authority, by confusing their speech and thus smashing 
up their “federation of labor.” ‘The destruction of that 
“industrial union’’—while it postponed till the predicted 
time of the Anti-Christ that yet-to-be-realized effort of the 
combined sons of men, to bring to its limit the foul work of 
the prince of this world—nevertheless resulted in a bitter 
dislike of nation for nation, out of which has sprung so large 
a measure of the boastful “patriotism” of the present day. 

For this reason, if for no other, it behooves the Christian 
to be carefully on his guard concerning it. 


Wrongs of the Colored Races 

Further, it must be borne in mind that while this racial 
hatred was thus conceived at Babel, the nationalism of our 
time is the result of multiplied evils which have grown out 
of centuries of strife between those races. For though God 
in judgment thus divided the original inhabitants of the 
earth, yet He “hath determined the times before appointed 
and the bounds of their habitation.’” ‘‘When the Most High 
divided to the nations their inheritance, when He separated 
the children of men he set the bounds of the peoples.’ 
Much of the political entanglement which has led to modern 
wars has come about because these “bounds” have been vio- 
lated, and stronger races have preyed upom weaker ones. 
Make no mistake, God has not been an uninterested specta- 
tor of the shameful wrongs, for example, which “civilized” 


1Acts 17:26. *Deut. 32:8, R. V. 


228 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


peoples have practiced on the colored and red-skinned races 
of the earth. ‘The recent cataclysm of bloodshed had other 
causes than those which appeared on the surface. The cruelty 
and injustice practiced upon the natives of Asia, Africa, 
Australia and America; the way they have been swindled 
out of their lands; the manner in which their women have 
been violated; their frightful demoralization through drink 
or opium, and their destruction by syphilis and masacre— 
those were also among the causes of the world war. 


The Cherokees and the Sword of Sherman 

‘Take, as one example, the manner in which the State of 
Georgia and the United States National Government, dealt 
with the Georgian Indians. According to Bacon’s “History 
of American Christianity” and Helen Hunt Jackson’s “A 
century of Dishonor,” no more shameful story of perfidy 
and oppression was ever told. We read: 

“The wrongs inflicted on the Cherokee Nation were deepened by 
every conceivable aggravation. No record is so black as the deal- 
ings between the United States Government and this nation.” 

These intelligent and progressive Indians had prosperous 
Churches, they had established mills for manufacturing cot- 
ton; their schools were flourishing; a great number had pro- 
fessed Christianity. “There is no instance,” the record tells 
us, “in all history of a race of people passing in so short 
a space of time from barbarism to the arts of agriculture and 
civilization.” But alas! Their prosperity proved their un- 
doing. ‘The beauty and fertility of their lands, augmented 
by the wealth of crops, cattle, herds, with which their in- 
dustry and thrift had enriched them, became known. With 
a venomous cupidity the pioneers of “‘civilization’”’ set their 
covetous eyes on so glittering a prize in the fingers of un- 
protected red-skins. In spite of the fact that the territory of 
the Cherokees “had been secured to them by the most sacred 
pledges with which it was possible for the National Govern- 
ment to bind itself,” the State of Georgia resolved to steal it. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 229 


“As a mere expedient for securing popular consent to the in- 
tended infamy, the farms of the Cherokees were parcelled out to 
be drawn for in a lottery and the lottery tickets distributed among 
the white voters. Then the fortified, the ‘brave’ State of Georgia, 
went to all lengths of outrage. Missionaries were arrested and 
sent to prison for preaching to Cherokees—Cherokees were sen- 
tenced to death by Georgian courts and hung by Georgian execu- 
tioners.” 


But the culminating deed of shame could not be carried 
out without the sanction of the United States Government, 
that government which has always boasted her champion- 
ship of justice, freedom and democracy. To her eternal 
disgrace it must be recorded that this scandalous act of 
spoliation toward a feeble people was agreed to after pro- 
longed discussion in the Senate by a majority of one. Thus 
by that act of long ago, another treaty was treated as a 
“scrap of paper.” 

It has ever been so. The white man has had little or no 
conscience about robbing the colored man. But the AlI- 
mighty’s principles of justice do not stop short at the color 
line in that way. He takes notice! May it not be said that 
when the sword and torch of Sherman passed, with terror- 
izing horror, through the fair State of Georgia, leaving 
behind its ghastly toll of dead, its black trail of wreckage 
and ashes, that the judgment which Georgia had meted to 
those helpless Cherokees was being “‘meted to her again.” 


The Christian Patriot 


Such, then, as regards the vastly greater part of it, is the 
“patriotism” of this world, and a poor, selfish, soulless, char- 
acterless, rotten thing it is. Mark, however, this is not by 
any means the patriotism of the Christian. Indeed, the 
Christian is the only citizen whose soul can be properly 
thrilled by the deeper, nobler patriotic fervor. To begin 
with, he is more closely related to the Jew—God’s chosen 
and only earthly nation—than is any other. He is “grafted 
in among them and with them partakes of the root and fat- 
ness” of that wonderful people." This is the “patriotism” 

7Rom, 11:17. 


230 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


which, above all others is commended by God and is precious 
to Him. And yet it is the only patriotism the world despises. 
Immeasurably more estimable to the Christian than the 
proudest records of his earthly birth-land, there comes along 
the ages to enrich his heritage, the conquests achieved by 
Jehovah Himself, when He led the victorious armies of 
Israel. For the Christian also is the subject of Jehovah. 
The King of the Jews is also his Saviour. The reason his 
patriotism so stirs the heart, is because it centers around the 
personality of his Lord. Never was there, nowhere ‘is 
there, never will there be, such a king as He. In the beauti- 
ful language of the Psalms the saints of today may also 
sing: 

“O give thanks unto the Lord, for the Lord hath chosen Israel 
for his peculiar treasure. Who alone doeth great wonders; who 
by wisdom made the heavens, stretched out the earth over the 
waters; made the sun, the moon, the stars; which remembered 
his people in their low. estate and redeemed them from their ene- 
mies; Who smote Egypt and brought out Israel from among them; 
Who in the day time led them with a cloud and all through the 
night with a light of fire; Who divided the Red Sea and caused 
them to pass through; Who overthrew Pharaoh and his hosts; 
Who led his people through the Wilderness, rained down manna 
and sent them meat to the full; Who cast out the heathen before 
them and smote great nations and slew mighty kings; Sihon king 
of the Amorites. Og king of Bashan with all the kings of Canaan 
and gave their land for a heritage to his people. Who brought 
them out of darkness and the shadow of death; Who sent forth 
his Word and healed them; Who giveth food to! all flesh; Whose 
throne is established of old. The scepter of whose kingdom is 
the right scepter. Whose mercy endureth forever. Blessed be 
the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting.”} 


Here indeed is something to shout about! Here is the 
supreme King of all true Christians. However much of 
“honor” we may render to earthly monarchs in recognition 
of their God-ordained temporal authority, such monarchs 
can never usurp the place which Jesus, as the King of Kings, 
has taken in our hearts. And mark it is precisely because our 


1Taken from Psas. 45, 91, 107, 108, 135, 136. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 231 


loyalty to this higher kingship is so binding that we are able 
to practice the best possible kind of earthly citizenship. 


The Church and the Jew 


It is significant that the Christian Church—that is, of 
course, the true Church—which Christ said should, in this 
dispensation, be the subject of prosperity with persecution— 
and the Jewish people who, in this day of their “setting 
aside,’ are also prosperous though much hated of men, stand 
together as the only two communities in the world who have 
reason to know much about pure “patriotism.” The Jewish 
nation, though homeless, kingless, and therefore without army 
or navy, has behind it all the prestige, and before it all the 
prospects which are needed as fuel for the flames of national 
honor. And the Christian Church, which, for the time 
being, is taking the place of Israel in the world, being joined 
to her rejected King, has the same rich heritage behind her 
and the same glorious promises for her future: “At that 
time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord, and all 
nations shall be gathered unto it”’*—“And many people shall 
go and say, Come ye, let us go up to the mountain of the 
Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach 
us of his ways and we will walk in his paths; for out of Zion 
shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusa- 
lem.”? Here, indeed, is a retrospect and a prospect which 
creates and inflames a real patriotism. 

But wherein does Christian patriotism differ from worldly 
patriotism in this present age and why is war inconsistent 
with it? 


piers ia:i7, 78a, 253, 


I. WAR IS UNPATRIOTIC FOR THE CHRIS- 
TIAN BECAUSE IT IS DETRIMENTAL TO 
HIS EARTHLY HOME-LAND 


While speaking for the moment from a purely earthly 
standpoint, the Christian is the truest and the most valuable 
citizen of the country in which God has placed him, his 
citizenship does not consist, as is the case with so many of 
the unregenerate, in a blind obedience to behests of men. He 
is no slave. He is a freeborn son of God. As possessor of 
that higher liberty, “wherewith Christ hath made us free,”* 
it is impossible that he should hand himself over, body, soul 
and spirit, to go at the dictate of wordly men to plunder and 
kill his fellow-man. If liberty, as a national heritage, is 
really the glorious principle it is made to appear in “declara- 
tions of independence,” songs of revolutions, brilliantly illu- 
minated statues, then such liberty-loving subjects, as are the 
followers of the Lord Jesus, must be constitutional pearls of 
great price. 


Conscience Counts for Nothing 


Hence, there is a reason why the true Christian cannot 
support armies and navies. They take away men’s liberties 
and bind their consciences. No man can join an army with- 
out swearing away, at peril of his life, his right to question 
the commands, whatever those commands may be, of those 
above him. One of the best known poetical glorifications of 
a regiment in action describes precisely the attitude of the 
soldier to his conscience: 


“Theirs not to make reply, 
Theirs not to reason why, 
Theirs but to dare and die.” 


1Gal. 5:1. 
232 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 233 


But this is the exact opposite of the Christian’s standard 
of citizenship. He is not to do or to permit anything in his 
life which violates his enlightened conscience. He is at all 
times, both as regards his belief and his transactions, to exer- 
cise himself “to have always a conscience void of offense 
toward God and toward men,”! and he is distinctly told, 
concerning the struggle in which he is engaged, that he is to 
“war a good warfare; holding . . . a good conscience.’? 
Most assuredly, then, he is not to kill his brother and send 
his soul to judgment without being able to render an account 
satisfactory alike to his conscience and to his God. 

But with war lords, field marshals and generals, such 
conscientious soldiers are regarded as obnoxious, dangerous 
traitors. The officer’s ideal fighting man, is one who oc- 
cupies himself entirely with the shooting and leaves his 
superiors to do the reasoning. ‘Though somewhat bluntly, 
this idea is expressed, with an absolute honesty, in a pre-war 
speech of the ex-Kaiser’s to a number of recruits. Here is 
what he said: 


“Recruits, before the altar and the servants of God, you have 
given me the oath of allegiance. You are too young to know 
the meaning of what has been said, but your first care must be to 
obey implicitly all orders and directions. You have sworn fidelity 
to me, you are the children of my guard, you are my soldiers, 
you have surrendered yourselves to me body and soul. Only one 
enemy can exist for you—my enemy. With the present socialistic 
machinations, it may happen that I shall order you to shoot your 
own relatives, your brothers, or even your parents—and then 
you are bound to obey implicitly my orders!” 

“Very like the hateful ‘Prussianism’ of the Kaiser!” we 
say, but this is actually the truth as regards all armies and 
all soldiering. I challenge any one to contradict me when 
I say that you will find this kind of teaching in the class- 
rooms of all military academies, all training schools for army 
and navy officers, as in every regimental barracks throughout 
the world. Some of it of course is not so bluntly said. But 


the logical result of the system is the same. In all these 


1Acts 24:16. #1 Tim, 1:18, 19. 


234 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


establishments conscience counts for nothing when it is up 
against the command of superior officers. 


Slavery! 


When the trimmings, tassels and gingle of armies are torn 
away, there lies behind them the same old grim, sinister thing 
called slavery. Worse in a sense than any slavery ever car- 
ried on by any slave-owner on a cotton or rubber plantation, 
for the darkies there were never bought and sold fo kill each 
other. From the Christian’s standpoint of citizenship, such 
surrender of independent thinking and liberty of conviction 
would be, in the highest degree, detrimental to his home- 
land. So far as he is concerned it would be injurious be- 
cause, should he submit to it, it would prevent his rendering 
the most valuable of all service to others. ‘To lose his liberty 
in Christ would mean the extinction of his spiritual power. 
Only on one condition could he ever pledge absolute obedi- 
ence to others—only because by so doing he could better 
follow his Master, and because a greater good might result 
for the world. Instantly he was summoned to any action 
which would violate the law of God, his contract would 
have to be canceled. 

And surely this is only the ‘reasonable service’ of any 
self-respecting, sincere and consistent Christian. Even 
the man of the world regards war as the most serious pur- 
suit in which he could possibly be engaged. To every 
thoughtful person it is also evident that the character of an 
act is determined by the motive which prompts it. It must, 
therefore, be a matter of supreme concern, that those who 
take the sword should be able to render a satisfactory rea- 
son, both to themselves and to God, for doing so. It is also 
equally evident that there could be no conviction that the 
cause for which one fights is justifiable, without a calm con- 
sideration of the why and the wherefore of the case by each 
individual concerned. A Christian cannot place upon 
another the responsibility of deciding whether he is justified 


I'HE SAINT AND THE SWORD 235 


in shooting his brother-man. For him to march off to 
spread death and ruin, for no better reason than that he is 
required to “obey orders,” would involve him in worse guilt 
than a common murderer, who at least has it to plead that he 
Is acting under provocation or because of the lure of some 
coveted advantage. 


The Christian conscience is far too precious in God’s 
sight and far too valuable a national asset, to be handed over 
to the rulers of this world, who frequently dispatch whole 
armies to die and to kill other armies, for causes which, 
did they affect individuals instead of nations, no court of 
justice would treat as life and death matters. It is for this 
reason that a true Christian cannot make himself a slave of 
any system which demands such blind obedience. To do so 
would, when judged from the viewpoint of the New Testa- 
ment, deprive him of the free exercise of that judgment 
which, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, he rightly re- 
gards as of the highest importance to the welfare of his home- 
land. 


The Christian and National Righteousness 


Nor must it be forgotten that Christians, as true patriots, 
are bound by every law of their religion to choose the 
highest good for their country. Wealth, education, culture, 
refinement, physical energy, commercial ability, clever diplo- 
macy—these are endowments which, while they undoubtedly 
assist the nations in their struggle for material pre-eminence, 
are not by any means so important as rectitude. As with 
persons so with peoples, it is character which tells. “Right- 
eousness exalteth a nation; but sin is a reproach to any peo- 
ple.”* Corruption, be it individual or collective, inevitably 
invokes disaster. No fury of armed cohorts, no defiance of 
great armadas, ever prevented the disintegration of an em- 
pire once its inherent wickedness ripened into moral rotten- 
ness. ‘The words of the prophet concerning Sodom, are 


1Prov. 14:34. 


236 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


equally applicable to all nations past and present: “Behold, 
this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom; pride, fulness of 
bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her 
daughters. ... And they were haughty and committed 
abomination before me; therefore I took them away as | saw 
good.”? Or as the Apostle Jude says: “Even as Sodom and 
Gomorrah, . . . giving themselves over to fornication, 
and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, 
suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.’ 

But judged by the New Testament standard, what is this 
righteousness which exalteth? Well, it is something more 
than morality, respectability, honesty in transaction and 
trade, it is the “righteousness which is of God by faith.’ 
That is to say, by faith in Christ. It is the righteousness 
which appertains to the coming kingdom of our Lord, and 
to which the Apostle refers when he writes to the Christians 
in the Roman Empire: ‘But unto the Son he saith, Thy 
throne, O God, is forever and ever, a scepter of righteous- 
ness is the scepter of thy kingdom.’”* 


The Christianity of Christ 

it is, then, Christ’s righteousness which exalteth nations, 
and their refusal to accept His atoning work which confirms 
them in the sin which is to prove their doom. Nor is it 
only Christ’s sacrifice they must accept; it is His standard. 
It is the rightness or wrongness of things as judged by 
Christ’s judgment—He Who said, “I am the way, the truth, 
and the life.’”® The Christian believes, or ought to believe, 
that the only “way” of true prosperity for nations is Christ’s 
way; that “truth’—which constitutes a force infinitely 
greater than armies and navies—finds its completeness in 
Christ, and that the only “life” worth living for a nation 1s” 
found in Him; that, in fact, outside the permission and 
purpose of God in Christ, a nation cannot exist at all. If, 
then, nations are to prosper, nothing is so important as that 


1Ezek. 16:49. *Jude 7. *Phil. 3:9. *Heb. 1:8. ‘John 14:6. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 237 


they should shape their laws in harmony with His laws, 
their doings according to His behests. This is so far recog- 
nized by all civilized governments, that they have built up 
the fabric of their constitutions upon the foundation of His 
teachings, always, however, reserving to themselves the right 
to abrogate such of them as might obstruct their schemes of 
ambitious greed or racial pride. 

What are these teachings? As we shall see, the law of 
Christ is the law of love—love is the fulfilling of His law— 
and love is as opposite to war as day is to night. If, then, 
the law of Christ, which is love, is the rule for a nation’s 
prosperity, and war is opposed to love, war must be detri- 
mental to the highest interests of the nation which wages it. 
This the true disciples of the Lord believe, and hence in 
fighting war they are evidencing the most exalted type of 
patriotism. It is the patriotism which opposes bravely those 
evil forces which, as germs of disease in the body politic, 
threaten its vigor and its life. 


Rome’s Best Citizens 


Who were the best patriots of ancient Rome? Looking 
back into that distant history, no one could hesitate to reply, 
“The early Christians.” Yet as a conquered race, in the 
midst of the proudest, most triumphant exponents of force, 
they practiced the principles of non-resistance, refusing to 
join the killing armies of Cxsar. Though in their day, 

partly for this cause, they were regarded as a dangerous and 
disloyal sect and reckoned among “the offscouring of all 
things,” yet time has shown that they were the most esti- 
mable subjects of the Imperial Empire. ‘The tyranny of 
Nero and Diocletian, which sought to cover them with 
shame, resulted only in demonstrating their importance, for 
it brought down upon these crowned heads, and later upon 
their dominions, the vengeance of God. They threw the 
Christians to the lions and their empire “went to the dogs.” 

By those who today would discredit a non-killing Chris- 


238 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


tian citizenship, the argument is often urged, that, to take 
the privileges and protection which one’s country affords, 
and leave others to fight for, and defend these privileges, is 
unjust if not cowardly. If this argument is addressed to 
unbelievers it is sound. Men having no better world to 
live for than this, no better weapons to fight with than guns 
and swords, should take the sword and live by it, remember- 
ing, however, that “they that take the sword shall perish 
with it.’ I am not defending cowardice. Nor am I plead- 
ing for “quitters.” But if the argument is addressed to 
Christians, it is based upon a false assumption. The Chris- 
tian, if he is not a mock one, is the best of all the “defend- 
ers” of his country. He is, in fact, already enlisted in the 
most effective defensive force in existence. He is in the 
front rank of the world’s moral police. 


Heroism That Suffers 


Nor must it be forgotten that all Christians, if they are 
of the genuine order and not counterfeits or caricatures, have, 
and will always have, their full share of suffering. In fight- 
ing the pestiferous and popular sins, which threaten the life 
of the nation, they won’t have an easy time of it. Especially 
so when the jingos start up their barbaric war-whoops, and 
the bellowing clique of newspapers begin their drum-beat- 
ing, saber-rattling, volley-firing policy. | 

The late war produced a noble host of martyrs. True the 
number was smaller than it ought to have been for many 
who had been anti-war exponents, under extreme pressure, 
went back on their principles and saved themselves by a 
miserable compromise. Nevertheless there were thousands 
throughout the world—notably in Germany—who cheerfully 
gave their lives, or languished in prisons, that they might 
preserve the teachings of the Lord Jesus and witness to their 
purity and power. Never fear, we who mean to stand true 
to our guns in the battle for truth, will have our full share 


1Matt. 26:52. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 239 


of the fighting. Nowadays, it takes more courage to keep 
out of the military butcher’s shop than to go into it. 

A blaspheming soldier in Australia, on his way to the 
South African War, riding with me on the train from Bris- 
baine to Sydney, kept up his courage by reminding us that it 
took a “ton of lead to kill one soldier,” and, with the odds 
all in his favor, he was going “‘to risk it!’ Why, many a 
man walks down every day to the foundry or the work- 
shop, assuming as great a risk as that. For a young fellow 
to resist boldly the accumulated force of public opinion and 
stay out of the army for principle’s sake, thereby incurring 
the opprobrium of his friends, who reckon him a coward; for 
him to brave the scorn of his pretty girl acquaintances, who 
treat him as a “pussy-foot,” and a subject for white feathers, 
because he refuses to betray his coriscience—all this is a 
greater test of moral pluck than he would experience when, 
adorned with the razzle-dazzle of a musketeer, he marched, 
amid applauding thousands, to “take his chances.” If the 
poor fellows who lost out in the game had known what 
awaited them; perhaps their “heroism” might have waned. 


A “Sammy’s” Opinion of a “Tommy’s” Heroism 


Without wishing to deny or depreciate the bravery which 
has, without doubt, been manifested on the European battle- 
fields, it is well to remember that a great deal of this bravery 
is not prompted by patriotic loyalty or a passionate love for 
-a worthy cause. Much of it is a courage by compulsion. 
Men are forced into a position where there is nothing left 
for them but to be brave in defending themselves, or to be 
bold in performing a duty they would very gladly shirk 
if they could get the chance. This is strikingly confirmed 
by Sergeant Empey’s book, Over the Top, already referred 
to. It is difficult to find anywhere in this book any evidence 
of that real passion for a great cause which, we are cease- 
lessly told from our pulpits, is the glory of our soldiers. 


240 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Almost every time mention is made in those pages of the 
call to actual conflict, it is not, we are told, with a spirit 
flaming to get at the foe, with hearts pulsing faster to follow 
the advancing standards of truth and honor; it is not with 
these sentiments that the majority of the soldiers leap to 
the fray, but rather with a sense of their ill luck in happen- 
ing to be the ones who man the trenches when the advance 
is sounded. ‘The book is full of expressions which, so far as 
the English ‘““Tommies” are concerned, indicate an ever- 
present desire, manifested by many ingemious devices, to get 
away from the battle’s front back to “Blighty’—as the 
soldier’s “furlough” in his home-land is called. Here are 
a few which speak for themselves: [The italics are mine. ] 


“We received the unwelcome tidings that the next morning we 
would ‘go in’ and ‘take over.’ It makes all the difference whether 
you are ‘going in’ or ‘going out.’ ” 

“Never any pushing or crowding to be first up those ladders— 
ladders of death.” 

“When Tommy is wounded he does not care whether it is a 
gunshot wound or.a kick from a mule, just so he gets back to 
‘Blighty’ ” : 

“Mentioned in dispatches for bravery—Tommy would rather 
be recommended for leave.” 

“Tommy has no desire for his name to appear on the ‘Roll of 
honor’ unless it comes under the heading ‘Slighty Wounded.’ ” 

“‘Sicker” Nickname for ‘Sick Report Book.’ It is Tommy’s 
ambition to get on the ‘Sicker’ without feeling sick.” 

“(Trench Feet’ ” A disease of the feet contracted in the 
trenches from exposure to extreme cold and wet. Tommy’s great- 
est ambition is to contract this disease, because it means ‘Blighty’ 
for him,” 

“ “Trench Fever. A malady contracted in the trenches... 
mostly homesickness. A bad case lands Tommy in ‘Blighty’ where 
he tries to get it worse than ever.” 

“ ‘Wave. In a charge the waves are numbered according to 
their turn in going over—viz., ‘first wave,’ ‘second wave,’ etc. 
Tommy would rather go over with the tenth wave!” 

“ ‘Victoria Cross,’ or ‘very careless’ as Tommy calls it. It is a 


bronze medal won by Tommy for being very careless with his j 


life.” 


Sergeant Empey ought to know what he talks of, since 


he was for two years with the soldiers at the front, but un- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 241 


less he has wickedly maligned his comrades, the kind of 
“heroism” he describes contrasts sharply with the heroism of 
those soldiers of Jesus who, along the ages, as today, 
prompted by a sense of devotion to the very highest truth, 
suffered, and have recently endured, derision, outcasting, im- 
prisonment and death itself, with an eager enthusiasm. 


“Ye Are the Light” 

Christ, when speaking of the relationship of His followers 
to the world, used three significant expressions. Two were 
uttered at the opening and one at the close of His ministry. 
Two were symbols and one was a direct command with a 
pledge attached to it. At the beginning He said, “Ye are 
the light” and “Ye are the salt!’! At the close He com- 
manded, “Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations. ... Lo, 
I am with you.”? As symbols, for the purpose of convey- 
ing the vital importance of God’s people to the community 
in the midst of which they live, none more perfect could 
have been found than these. 

In the first place, the Christian is light, and light is revela- 
tion—truth, and truth is greater than all material forces. 
Truth is that which appeals to the reason—the mind, and 
mind in the long run rules matter, for it is greater than 
matter. Truth appeals to the heart, to the more potent in- 
stincts and impulses in the human breast. It triumphs by 
calling into existence the mighty suasion of love, not by an 
appeal to the treacherous and uncertain impulses of force 
and fear. As we have already noticed, force and fear, when 
exercised judicially, have their uses; but the light of truth 
lifts one above the sway of force and fear. Those who know 
the power of reason and have yielded to it need not the in- 
centive of the magistrate’s intimidation or the policeman’s 
bludgeon. It is their choice to do right—“I will put my 
laws into their minds.’”*® The Christian spreads the light, 
and by so doing wields a sword in defense of his country 


4Matt. 5:13, 14. *Matt. 28:19, 20. *%Heb. 8:10. 


242 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


infinitely more protective than any blade of steel—‘“The 
truth shall make you free.’ 

Take for example the force of truth in relation to the 
European war. Had the Church of Christ in Austria, Ger- 
many, France, England and Russia taken her stand by her 
Master; had she declared to all the world that it was against 
the law of Christ; that, for the Church, quarrels of any kind 
should be put to the arbitrament of the sword—had she 
backed her argument by the declaration that under no cir- 
cumstances would she join the killing armies, it is probable 
she would, by this determination, have created such a con- 
science on the question that powerful societies, like the 
Socialists and Laborites, whose principles are completely anti- 
military, would have taken courage, followed after her lead, 
and no government would have dared to fire a gun. 


Propaganda Without Power 

The Church of Christ ought to have had the divine 
power, she should have had sufficient spiritual ammunition, 
the power of the Holy Ghost, to stand alone and face the 
storm, in which case she would either have stopped the war 
or brought upon herself such persecution, and with it such 
enduement of the Holy Spirit, as would have heralded the 
greatest revival since the early days of Christianity. It is 
just here she would have excelled over all the socialistic and 
pacifist movements of our time, some of whom “‘hold the 
truth in unrighteousness,’ and others of whom have “the 
form of godliness” while they lack “the power thereof.” 
It is for the Church to show these societies, which assent to 
the doctrines of “international brotherhood,” where they 
could find the love and the power to put their theories into 
operation. Alas! she missed her opportunity. 

Everywhere, thanks to the influence of the words of the 
Lord Jesus and His true representatives, there has been 
created a tremendous prejudice against war. All the great 


John 8:32. 


eee ee 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 243 


movements which champion the cause of the toilers and the 
poor, as well as some other powerful organizations, like the 
various Peace Societies, are against war. Even the crowned 
heads, the eminent statesmen of the Old World, could 
not get their policies of “preparedness” past the representa- 
tives of the people without talking peace. They filled their 
arsenals with the weapons which have slaughtered or maimed 
ten millions of men by “talking peace.”’ No king nowadays 
could keep his crown for three months and talk war for 
war's sake, or for the sake of aggrandizment. Everywhere 
the anti-war conviction is latent. 


Mind, I do not say that this conviction is an evidence of 
allegiance to Christ. It is frequently expressed by those who 
have little sympathy with the Gospel. But I do say that 
the conviction concerning the futility of war was latent in 
every country where and when the war broke out. All that 
was required was some agency, some community, with suf- 
ficient pluck to stand in the breach, and by bold, reckless, 
fearless declaration, by standing resolutely to the words of 
Jesus, strike the spark, shed the true “light,” and refuse to 
fight. Had this been done, I believe that what was so power- 
fully latent would instantly have become patent, and there 
would probably have been such an expression of pent-up 
feeling, that every sword in Europe would have gone back 
into its scabbard. 


Passive Resistance and Passive Assistance 


But events transpired exactly as the Saviour prophesied. 
Alas! no organization dared to protest. Least of all, it must 
be said, to its eternal shame, did the Church of the living 
God, with one or two noble exceptions, raise any opposi- 
tion. In enlightened England the professed Church, the 
nonconformist part of which has of late years, concerning 
matters of denominational distinction, so busied itself with 
“passive resistance;” the conscience of which has been so 
profoundly stirred about ecclesiastical privileges in schools, 


244 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


as to justify ministers in defying the law and going to 
prison—this great and powerful nonconformist community, 
with but few glorious exceptions, had never a word of cau- 
tion or protest for those who were plunging their nations into 
a course of wholesale slaughter. No prominent “passive re- 
sisters’ of that old educational quarrel have entered prison 
in the cause of peace. “They kept their eyes on the indicator 
at Westminster. When it pointed to war they decided to 
say devoutly “amen,” and pronounce the benediction! They 
buried their public school animosities, joined hand and glove 
with the lords and bishops who fell back, as they invariably 
do in the face of every war, on their State-Church policy, and 
finally joined with the godless mob in singing the praise of 
the allied armies who, whatever they may have been fighting 
for, were certainly not fighting for the Church or the 
Kingdom of Christ, any more than they were employing the 
weapons He told His servants to use. As we shall show 
later, democracy is not Christianity. 


In those eventful days of August, 1914, when all civilized 
mankind held its breath in anxious wonder concerning the 
fateful issues which threatened the world, I remember how 
eagerly I scanned the daily papers to see what stand the 
Church had taken. Of what statesmen were doing we were 
well informed. ‘They were watching their countries’ inter- 
ests, their “national safety.” ‘They were out for their peoples 
to obtain, or maintain, those “places in the sun’ they so 
greatly coveted or they had already so abundantly secured— 
places which, as past history shows, despite any “scraps of 
paper” which might help or hinder them, it was their inten- 
tion to get or to keep. But from the Church, the professed 
Body of the loving, suffering, resurrected Saviour—the 
Church universal, called to be the invincible contender for 
the faith as propounded on the lips of her Lord—of this 
Church we heard, in the way of protest,—nothing. 





| 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 245 


They All Began to Make Excuses 


From the cathedrals of Austria, Russia, Britain and 
France; from the stately sanctuaries of Germany and even 
the “free”? Churches of England, there came no news of gath- 
ering saints for prayer; no prophetic voice was lifted to 
plead the efficacy of faith and love over suspicion, fear and 
vengeance. Reviewing the Uhlans of Berlin, the Grenadiers 
of Whitehall, the Cossacks of Petrograd, the Cuirassiers of 
Paris—looking on. all these terrible legions, ‘whose feet are 
swift to shed blood,’ as they marched out with Church 
chaplains and ecclesiastical sanctions to cut each other’s 
throats, many troublesome questions without doubt arose in 
the minds of many eminent “divines” in the several nations. 
It became evident that something would have to be done 
which, while meriting the favor of their respective govern- 
ments, would justify the dignitaries of the Church before 
the conscience of mankind. So “they all with one consent 
began to make excuse.” 


Hence, long after any protests or explanations of any 
kind were any good, there began to appear declarations and 
counter-declarations from ‘Church federations” in the dif- 
ferent countries. Epistles, for instance, from the leaders 
of the Churches in Germany to the leaders of the Churches in 
Britain, stating “with what regret they had been compelled 
to give their approval” and their blessing, not to the policy 
of the “pierced hand” of the Saviour, but to that of the 
“mailed fist” of the soldier, in striking against the menace of 
English world dominance’—the “shameful and unmerited 
attack upon their beloved fatherland.” ‘These were, of 
course, promptly replied to by equally convincing documents 
proving conclusively that the fatherland had only itself to 
blame for becoming the home of intolerable autocracy, shame- 
less aggression and merciless militarism. “There could be 
no more damning indictment of war than that which is 
afforded by these documentary “defenses,” issued by the 


246 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Churches of Christ in the contending countries. They give 
without any sort of palliation the direct lie to each other. 
They prove the utter inefficiency, the dangerous unreliability, 
of any existing tribunal for deciding the justice of the wars 
which involve the slaughter of millions of men. If the arch- 
bishops have no means of arriving at an equitable decision, 
_ where shall the diplomats and the patriots find one? 


Inactive Shepherds and Devouring Wolves 


Nor in the United States did the professed Church of 
Christ give forth any more illuminating light, or exhibit 
any greater courage on this question. “Take the Churches of 
Chicago as typical of those of the country. I watched care- 
fully through the days when events seemed to be leading up 
to a rupture with Germany, and when this favored land 
was about to be plunged into the guilt and sorrow of war. 
Sunday after Sunday, among the published subjects for 
pastors’ discourses, I failed to discover, with only one or 
two noble exceptions, any attempt, on the part of these 
pastors, to guide either their flocks or the agitated public 
mind. Each day the newspapers were resorting to every 
conceivable device for inflaming the nation with the spirit 
of envy, pride, and strife, but the Church here, as in Eu- 
rope, did nothing—absolutely nothing! 

One would have thought that with the world on fire, with 
the trenches of Europe running blood, the shepherds, whose 
duty it is to “feed the flock of God,” who are required to 
watch for dangers that beset it, would have perceived the 
approaching pack of wolves whose reeking fangs had already 
wrought such havoc in the Christian folds of other lands, 
and would have warned their sheep accordingly. At least 
one would have supposed they would have said something, 
either to justify all this wolf-biting or to have condemned it. 
But it seemed as though the Devil had gone on a special 
pilgrimage to all the Chicago parsonages, and had given these 
shepherds the lockjaw, that they might not commit them- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 247 


selves indiscreetly to the words of the ‘Chief Shepherd,” 
until they were assured of what the Government of the 
United States was going to say about it. In these momentous 
days, it must be said with sorrow and a sense of shame that 
so far as collective action in protesting against war is con- 
cerned, it was left to the societies outside the Church, such as 
the Socialists, to organize meetings against war. “They 
alone lifted up a standard in opposition to “the howling hub- 
bub of the hysterical press patriots.” 

Thus, in this midnight hour of the world’s history the 
Church, by exchanging the illuminating lamp of her Master’s 
teaching for the bloody tools of the assassin, has probably 
missed the greatest opportunity for winning eternal fame in 
heaven, and averting immeasurable disaster on earth which, 
in this age, will ever be given her. 

When the Lord suddenly returns to call His Bride to 
Himself, how many will be found with a faith sufficient to 
have enabled them to go all the way with His words? Not 
many! But thank God there are a faithful few—more than 
we dream of—who have not “bowed the knee to Baal’— 
whose lamps are trimmed and burning. ‘These are they to 
whom He referred when He said, “Ye are the light’ —‘‘Fear 
not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give 
you the kingdom.” 


“Ye are the Salt” 


But again, according to the symbolism of Christ, the 
Christian is the true patriot because he is more than “‘light,” 
he is “salt’’—‘Ye are the salt of the earth.” I am not of 
course, speaking of the salt which has “‘lost its savor,’ which 
is always found in the place where the Master said it be- 
longed—“under the foot of man;’”’ that is to say, under the 
feet of the worldly, godless crowd. It is.a shocking but 
ungainsayable fact that the vast majority of professing Chris- 
tians have so little of the true salt of God’s truth, that, 


1Luke 12:32. 


248 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


not only is their influence for good among sinners a negligible 
quantity, but the infinitesimal quantity of salt they have left 
is being continually more unsavored by the world. In times 
of crisis, when brave men are needed, they invariably prac- 
tice the art of “watchful waiting” till they see which way 
“the cat is going to jump,” then they promptly follow in the 
same direction and begin at once to use all their argumenta- 
tive powers to justify themselves and those who jumped 
before them. Christians of this type are not the “salt” I 
speak of. That kind of salt the Lord rightly described when 
He said, “It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast 
out, and to be trodden under the foot of man.” And verily 
a most accommodating foot-path to hell such mock saints 
have ever paved for millions to walk over, with assured 
steps and dormant consciences. 


If there is one thing more than another for which God 
holds a withering contempt and which invokes His fierce 
anger, it is unsavored salt in His professed Church. 


No. I am speaking of the true saints who are the “‘salt 
of the earth.” What a wonderful symbol! Could any 
imagery more perfectly portray the strength of the defense 
which the “out-and-out” followers of Christ afford to the 
land of their sojourn in this age? As an agent for protec- 
tion, salt is infinitely more potent than gunpowder. Of all 
the preservatives in the world, on land or sea, none are to be 
compared for their effectiveness with salt. Without salt, in 
the hills, on the plains, in the waters of the deep, in the 
spheres of the animal and vegetable worlds, in the food of 
beast and man, the whole globe would be turned into a 
sepulcher of putrid corruption. It is salt which holds in 
check the annihilating forces of pollution. 


What salt is in the natural realm the true Church of | 
Christ is in the realms moral and spiritual. It is the agency — 


which prevents the contaminating forces of evil from quickly 
completing their work of destruction. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 249 


The Real Defenders 


Let those who despise the Christian, because he refuses to 
go down into a fratricidal carnage to defend what men are 
pleased to call his country’s, or some other country’s, “‘inter- 
ests,” let them reflect on the fact that but for the presence 
in this world of Christ’s Church, as the dwelling place of 
the Holy Spirit, the nations of the earth would have become 
so morally corrupt that God would have long ago ‘‘dumped 
the whole bunch into hell.” In that hour when the Spirit- 
possessed saints, who constitute earth’s preserving salt, are 
suddenly translated to be with the Lord, when the full fury 
of the powers of darkness seize upon mankind, then the 
sneering worlding, with the faithless, foolish, lifeless pro- 
fessors “left” behind, will find out how much more they 
owed for their preservation to the guardian ministry of 
God’s true people than they did to all the armed legions in 
the world. The true patriot is not the fellow who yells for 
a flag, for which frequently he has so little real regard 
that he will allow it to weather all storms and to hang 
before his house like a washed-out rag, he is the citizen who 
stands unflinchingly for the principles which the flag rep- 
resents. 

The Apostle understood the value of true saints to the 
world, when writing about the encroaching powers of the 
Anti-Christ he declared, “For the mystery of lawlessness 
doth already work, only there is one that restraineth now, 
until he be taken out of the way, and then shall be revealed 
the lawless one whom the Lord shall slay with the breath of 
his mouth.”* ‘The “one that restraineth” is the Holy Spirit 
in the hearts of the true saints who, in an unexpected mo- 
ment, are to be “taken out of the way.” And note further, 
even after they are gone and the “great tribulation,” that 
frightful tempest of sorrow and bloodshed, shall have broken 
over the world, even then the protecting influence of the 
saints who—though shut out from the “marriage” will have 


12 Thess. 2:7, 8. 


250 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


repented and turned to the Lord—shall once more be mani- 
fested; for Jesus tells us that “except these days should be 
shortened there should no flesh be saved; but for the elect’s 
sake those days shall be shortened.”* 

Oh, how contemptible is the demeaning of the Church, the 
Church described as Christ’s “glorious Church not having 
spot or wrinkle or any such thing’—‘“the Church of the 
first-born which are written in heaven,” the Church so 
armed with spiritual forces ‘“‘that the gates of hell shall not 
prevail against it,” what a contemptible belittling before the 
world of that Church it is when archbishops, bishops, emi- 
nent so-called ‘free’ divines, and ecclesiastical hosts of duly 
ordained officialdom, together with censor-scared guardians 
of the religious press, turn pulpits and editorial sanctums into 
agencies for recruiting men to go and shoot each other! 
What a spectacle for angels and men it is when these servants 
of the Most High are seen hurrying to assure their several 
governments that they intend to support, not the surely tri- 
umphant Gospel, nor the policy of confidence in the Lord as 
the avenger of wrong, but a policy of reliance upon “horses 
and chariots,’ lyddite, dynamite, and other floating, flying, 
sneaking, explosive damnation! 


The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth 


But glory to God for the loyal minority which, though 
insignificantly small, has stood unflinchingly for the truth in 
the midst of all this Christ-contradicting advocacy of fury. 
These have refused to participate in this cut-throat ecclesias- 
ticism, which distributes Bibles and preaches salvation while 
it winks at hell-fire, bombardments and assassination. Since 
they are not conformed to the spirit of this age, they have 
dared to be counted “unpatriotic” by even a goodly number 
of doctors of divinity, who seem to have taken to pugilism 
as a more effective method of correcting the world’s evils 
than Holy Ghost persuasion, prayer and the Gospel. 


1Matt. 24:22. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 281 


Let this little flock of faithful ones count it all joy when 
men thus persecute them, treat them as cowards and cover 
them with scorn because they refuse to shed a brother’s blood. 
The Christian is under no kind of obligation to do wrong 
in order to defend governments which are controlled by 
godless majorities, worldly kings, or Christ-rejecting bureau- 
cracies. He is here to enlighten and honor them, since they 
are the representatives of order in the world, but he is not 
called to lay down his life for them. It is they rather, be- 
cause they have never recognized Christ as their Sovereign 
King, who are obligated to the Christian—‘‘Do ye not know 
that the saints shall judge the world?! No rebel against 
God has any real claim upon a square inch of this globe. 
“The earth is the LORD’S, and the fulness thereof.’’ 
Yes, this old world is the Lord’s and “‘in the dispensation 
of the fulness of times” He will “gather together in one, all 
things in Christ . . . which are on earth. ... In whom 
also we have obtained an inheritance,” the “earnest” of 
which is “sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise,” “until 
the redemption of the purchased possession.”? God in the 
mouth of His Son has declared that “the meek”—the peo- 
ple who by certain men of this world are called ‘“pussy- 
foots,” and not the men who advocate “big-stick” regenera- 
tion, shall inherit the earth. Let the governments of this 
world remember this and let them not forget the peril they 
assume when they afflict or prosecute the Lord’s people, for 
better would it be for kings and presidents “if a millstone 
were hanged about their necks and they were cast into the 
sea, than that they should offend one of these little ones.’ 


Peace Sentiment Without the Spirit 
But once more Jesus in the closing hours of His earthly 
ministry said: “Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations. 
. . . Lo, lam with you always.”® The Christian is the repre- 


41 Cor. 6:2. *Psa. 24:1. ‘Luke 17:2. 5Matt. 28:19, 20. 8Eph. 1:10, 
11, 14. See Isa. 49:22, 23. 


252 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


sentative, and in a blessed sense, the conveyer of Christ 
to the world—the Christ of the Gospel. That Gospel which 
is more than “Light,” and more than “Salt,” because it is 
power—‘‘the Power of God unto Salvation.”* It does more 
than illuminate, it convicts—changes the hearts of men. 
It so alters, as it were, their center of gravity, that the attrac- 
tion of “old things,” for possession of which they once went 
to die or to kill, loses its spell, and things of an immeasur- 
ably higher order, and which are won not by physical fight- 
ing but by faith, hold supernatural sway over their souls. 
This Gospel force—the force of Christ in the heart, is im- 
measurably more removed from the force of military power 
than a Mauser rifle is from a catapult. It has wrought 
accomplishments for the world which all the arms it contains 
are powerless to achieve. God, knowing this, has decided 
that He will deal with the nations as they deal with that 
Gospel, and with those who proclaim it. It needs no argu- 
ment to show that the Christian who in sincerity fights “the 
good fight of faith,” is a much better defender of his coun- 
try than he who shoulders a rifle, and goes to spread hatred 
and destruction all along his path. He goes so to teach the 
nations, so to instruct them, that they may have “learned 
Christ,” and being taught religion “‘as the truth is in Jesus’? 
they may “put on Christ.” ‘Then, to make all this possible, 
the Christian takes with him the Lord Jesus as the living 
power of that truth—‘‘Lo, I am with you alway.’’* 


Here is the need of the hour and herein is that which 
differentiates the “peacemakers,” who win the benediction 
which Christ promised at the close of His Sermon on the 
Mount from most of the Peace Movements of the present 
day. These peace organizations, while excellent as far as 
they go, do not go far enough. They are based on principles 
of expediency, philosophy, political economy or other purely 
temporal advantages. “The seed-purpose is all right, but 


1Rom. 1:16. "Eph. 4:20, 21. *Gal. 3:27. ‘Matt. 28:20. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 253 


there is nothing to germinate it. Hence, there is little fruit- 
age of these movements when the real test comes. 


The collapse of most of the organizations which have so 
eloquently advocated pacific policies and the diplomatic 
somersaults many of their champions have executed before 
a wondering world has been painful to behold. Instantly 
war is proclaimed their principles are surrendered to their 
patriotism. “We must support our King, our Kaiser, our 
President,” they say, “and wait some more convenient sea- 
son to advocate our cause.” ‘The principles of the Prince of 
Peace are discarded as soon as some earthly potentate, or 
parliament, declares for a policy the very reverse of all He 
taught. Some of the leaders even, in the conflict against 
war, rush off to “stand by” President or King, and so the 
Lord Jesus is made to stand aside while they give their 
allegiance to earthly kingdoms in carrying into effect an 
anti-christian policy. 

It is the Devil’s plan for this age to try and redeem man- 
kind without Christ—to get the desirable consequences of 
Christianity without their divine origin. He would steal 
the glory which comes by the Cross, while shirking its shame 
and denying its redeeming work. Hence, the cry of “peace, 
peace, when there is no peace,” that is to say, the attempt to 
get peace by methods which leave out the Gospel and which 
can, therefore, never secure it. The sole guarantee of peace 
between nations, as between individuals, is the unifying over- 
lordship of the Prince of Peace—He Who is first Saviour, 
then Lord, then coming King. 


War and Disobedience 
War and disobedience to Christ go together—‘“Thou 
shalt do no murder.” The remedy for one is the cure for 
the other. The remedy is the “love of God shed abroad in 
the heart” through faith in the atoning work of the Saviour. 
It is a peace society based on this principle the world needs. 


254 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


A society resolved to maintain the principles of Jesus Christ, 
through the merits and power of Christ, because it is the 
command of Christ. Such societies have always achieved 
mighty things, since God has owned them and the Holy 
Spirit has energized them. 

This is the teaching which the CHRISTIAN is to take 
to the nations, and because he goes to teach them everything 
which would prevent them fighting each other, he cannot 
help them by joining in their quarrels. He is to baptize 
them, not in the name of the frightful trinity of war gods, 
whose armies redden the earth, whose navies plow the seas, 
whose air-ships cleave the sky, but in the name of the Holy 
Trinity—the Father of love, the Saviour of love, the Spirit 
of love. For the Christian to do other than this would be 
the rankest disloyalty, not only to his higher citizenship in 
heaven, but to his home-land on earth. 





Il. WAR IS UNPATRIOTIC FOR THE CHRIS- 
TIAN BECAUSE IT VIOLATES THE 
LAWS OF HIS HEAVENLY 
CITIZENSHIP 


This is, for the Christian, a supreme question. He has a 
double citizenship—one below, one above, one here, one 
hereafter. His spiritual citizenship, which, during this pres- 
ent age, until the Lord Jesus returns to establish His king- 
dom on this earth, is in heaven, is that which takes 
precedence over his obligations to all earthly kingdoms. If 
we are to live in this present time ‘‘as becometh saints,” we 
must above all things get a clear understanding of the correct 
relationships of these two citizenships to each other. Mal- 
adjustment in this matter is responsible for the Church’s 
loss of power and inactivity more than anything else. While 
Christians, as we have seen, are called to a loyal and faith- 
ful citizenship in the kingdoms of this age, they must nevet 
forget that in no sense are these kingdoms of Christ. No 
nation in the world can truthfully call itself Christian. Of 
course it may claim to be “Christianized,” for all that is 
most valuable in each of these nations has found its origin 
in Christianity. But that does not make them Christian. 
Only that which is in living union with Christ and is sub- 
servient to Him is truly Christian. A Christian nation 
would have to be composed of citizens the large majority at 
least of whom were children of God, adopted into His 
family by the new birth through faith in His cross. No 
nation today makes any such claim. ‘The vast majority of 
those composing the populations of the most enlightened 
countries make no profession of allegiance to Christ. In 
no practical way do they recognize His overlordship, they 
seldom if ever enter His courts, they know nothing of 
His spirit. 

255 Me 


256 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Fighting for Doomed Kingdoms 


Even governments whose parliaments are opened with 
prayer, whose public celebrations are associated with ecclesi- 
astical ritual, are made up of men who, for the most part, 
have no spiritual vision, no real love for the Saviour. After 
parliamentary chaplains have “said the prayers,’ the name 
of Christ is hardly ever mentioned in the council chambers 
of the nations, certainly He is not regarded as an ever- 
present supreme authority, when interests of nations are con- 
sidered or their laws enacted. No representative of the 
people ever rises in the legislative assemblies of the world to 
read from the New ‘Testament his authority for moving a 
resolution, for introducing a bill, or for casting a vote. So 
completely is Christ banished from modern Parliament 
Houses, that were He to pass through their closed doors as 
He once did on a memorable occasion, in another place, and 
greet the assembled legislators with the salutation so appro- 
priate to the hour—‘‘Peace be unto you,” hardly an occupant 
of the government or opposition benches would recognize 
Him. I am afraid the majority of them would be ashamed 
of Him. 

Neither can any one who knows her true spiritual condi- 
tion deny that there is reason to question whether even the 
professed Church herself would, for the most part, hail her 
Lord were He to reappear within her portals. Strange to 
say, though He purchased her with His blood, though she 
has acquired all she possesses by the sentiment created by His 
cross, His gentle spirit is seldom found at her altars—He 
stands outside her gates. With the ear of the spirit one may 
hear Him crying, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.”* 

Nor must the Christian forget that, notwithstanding the 
fact that God has ordained the principle of human govern- 
ment, the systems of this world are not God’s systems. Re- 
publics, democracies, unions, federations, are doubtless © 
safer in the present state of mankind than autocracies. 


1Rev. 3:20. 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 257 


Though the tyranny of the “trusts” may be even more in- 
tolerable than the arrogancy of kings, yet democracies have 
a great advantage in that they afford the opportunity for 
“blowing off” the force of anger which accumulates in the 
national breast. A pleasing sense of authority rests upon 
the people when, without creating a revolution, a mayor or 
a prime minister is turned out of office and, speaking figura- 
tively, is “kicked down the stairs.” To be able to do these 
things flatters an outraged populace, and makes it easier to 
go on enduring the wrongs which another crop of wire- 
pullers and unprincipled politicians will most assuredly rise 
up to inflict upon it. 

But what the Christian has to note carefully is that these 
much prized democracies are not according to God’s plan of 
government. When His Son comes back to govern the 
world, He is not returning as a president or a premier, sub- 
ordinate to the will of the people, He is coming as—‘‘the 
blessed and only potentate, the King of kings and Lord of 


lords.’ 
Their Days are Numbered 


Again the kingdoms of this age are passing away. ‘Their 
time is running to its close. God’s clock will soon strike 
twelve again, when they will vanish whereas the kingdom 
to which the Christian owes his chief allegiance is an 
everlasting kingdom, and it is yet to come—‘“Thy king- 
dom come.” ‘That kingdom is not going to be brought in 
by the might of bloody weapons, in the hands of proud im- 
perial War-Lords. Doubtless such an idea is very gratifying 
to those whose soldiers and sailors keep ward and watch 
over most of earth and sea. Notwithstanding the general 
expectation of “modern scholarship,” the kingdom of mil- 
liennial glory is NOT going to be introduced as a cul- 
minating tribute to the genius of fallen mam or by a process 
of “evolving” ideas leading up into combinations of armies, 
navies, and other sorts of godless federations. ‘That king- 


er Tim, 6:1, 


258 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


dom is not going to be “brought in” or “worked out” or 
“made up,” but as Philip Mauro reminds us, we are dis- 
tinctly told it is “coming down,” the ““New Jerusalem which 
cometh down out of heaven.” So the Christian needs to 
be much on his guard against the snare of getting into wrong 
relations with these earthly kingdoms. ‘They are by no 
means the kingdoms of his Lord, and while there are cer- 
tain duties and obligations which he must necessarily under- 
take—‘“rendering to Czsar the things that are Casar’s’— 
yet, as regards those things which absorb the attention and 
capture the affections of men in this age, he is among them 
as a “stranger and pilgrim” and he must carefully guard 
against rendering to Cesar “the things that are God’s.’”? 


The Heavenly Citizenship and the United States Citizen 


We must recollect that “our citizenship is in heaven, 
whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.’ 
This is the citizenship we have got to keep in the place of 
supremacy. It is in regard to that coming King and His 
approaching kingdom that our truest “patriotism” is to be 
manifested, our utmost endeavors are to be put forth. All 
other allegiance of whatsoever kind must be subordinated 
to the laws of that higher citizenship, to the command of 
this supreme King. 

Perhaps the citizenship of the United States, as regards 
a vast proportion of its population, affords the best illustra- 
tion of the Christian’s relationship both to the kingdoms of 
this age and the coming kingdom of our Lord. Most of the 
citizens of the United States are of foreign extraction, an 
enormous number are foreign born, not a few are of com- 
paratively recent naturalization. When an applicant for 
citizenship in this country takes out his papers, he is required — 
to renounce certain allegiances he has hitherto paid to the 
land of his birth. He must abandon certain claims upon his ~ 
fatherland, and abjure certain obligations which, up till that 
time, his king or his government have laid upon him. These — 

tRey. 3:12. *Matt. 22:21; 1 Pet. 2:11. *Phil. 3:20 R. VY. 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 259 


allegiances, claims, obligations, are those that would affect 
or destroy his loyalty to his newly adopted government. But 
there are other allegiances and claims, which he is not re- 
quired to ignore or renounce, but which he is permitted to 
recognize conditionally upon their never being allowed to 
interfere with the interests of his new home-land, these must 
always, under all circumstances, take precedence over the 
concerns of all other countries. When it comes to those 
vital issues where choices are necessary between what is 
“foreign” and what is American, though they should have 
to fight those native instincts which run in their blood, the 
Stars and Stripes must be hoisted above every other flag, 
and if needful men must fight for America even though they 
have to fight their friends of former years. Mind, I am 
giving an illustration, I am not defending such fighting. 


Heavenly Before Earthly Obligations 


This is, however, precisely the position in which every true 
Christian is placed, and for which I do most emphatically 
contend. When by “the new birth” he is adopted into the 
family of God, he becomes not only a member of Christ’s 
Church, but a citizen of the Kingdom of Heaven. That 
kingdom, which although in this age, it “cometh not with 
observation” and is “not of this world,” is none the less a 
reality today in its spiritual or “mystery” form, while the 
Lord is gathering His Church from among the Gentile 
nations. We, as members of that spiritual kingdom and 
Church, come under the rule of higher laws than any which 
pertain to this dispensation. The standard of the New 
Testament is our code of law—the law of love. “Thou 
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with 
all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and 
great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou 
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two com- 
mandments hang all the law and the prophets.”? Thus the 


1Matt. 22:37, 40. 


260 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Christian’s obligation to the law of his heavenly citizenship 
is more binding than any other. All his relationships to 
things of this life must be subject to that higher law. His 
loyalty to all earthly institutions, his reverence for, his 
support of, “powers that be;” his obedience to all human 
legislation, even his allegiance to all family ties, must be sub- 
jected to the teachings of the New ‘Testament, which con- 
stitute the requirements of the New Covenant into which 
he has entered with his Lord. 

While, as in the case of the naturalized American citizen, 
he continues to hold certain relationships with his old con- 
nections, while he is permitted to participate in the affairs 
of the world, to cherish affections there, to pursue earthly 
callings—‘“‘not slothful in business,”+ yet all these relation- 
ships are to be “in the Lord’—pleasing to Him, and never 
in opposition to His interests or His Word. 

Qualifying Clauses 


Have you not noticed the number and strength of what 
might be termed the “qualifying clauses” that surround 
those passages in the New Testament which are always em- 
ployed by the advocates of war in support of their case? 
‘These passages can be used by such advocates only by an 
unjustifiable wresting of the text from the context. When 
the Bible refers to those points of contact with questionable 
earthly affairs about which there is danger of misunder- 
standing—where great care is required to prevent false and 
fatal reading—these Scriptures are illuminated by surround- 
ing passages which guard them, so to speak, against mistaken 
interpretation. 

Take, for instance, those almost universally misunder- 
stood verses relating to earthly authority, and therefore to 
war, found in the thirteenth chapter of the Epistle to the 
Romans, the second chapter of the First Epistle of Peter, 
the second chapter of the First Epistle to Timothy and 
the second chapter of the Epistle to Titus. Some of the 


1Rom, 12:11. 








THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 261 


most brilliant intellects, the most godly men in the Church, 
seem to me to stumble, as regards war, over these verses. 
Take Romans thirteen. In verses one to seven, there cer- 
tainly are expressions which would seem by the mention of 
the magistrate’s sword and the insistence on obedience due 
to earthly authorities, to justify war for the Christian. 
Concerning the distinction between the use of the sword 
by the magistrate and the soldier, I. have already spoken 
(see page 105). Here, since this Scripture and those in 
the Peter, Timothy and Titus Epistles are so vital to the 
subject, I want to place the sentences referred to by the 
war advocates and the qualifying passages immediately sur- 
rounding them, side by side. Study them then carefully. 


_ Were Paul and Peter Non-resistants? 


(All italics are mine) 


Passages surrounding these 
alleged war-texts which are 
anti-war and show the char- 
acter of the obedience the 
Christian is to render. (With 
comments. ) 


Passages used to defend ab- 
solute obedience to earthly au- 
thorities, when they insist on 
participation in war. 


Passages taken from Rom. 12:14-213 13:1-10 


“Bless them which persecute 
you; bless, and curse not.” 

“Recompense to no man evil 
for evil.” 

“Tf it be possible, as much as 
“lieth in you, live peaceably 
with all men”’—your ability to 


“Let every soul be subject un- 
to the higher powers.” 


“There is no power but of 
God.” 


“Whosoever therefore resist- 
eth the power resisteth the ordi- 
nance of God.” 


“They that resist shall re- 
ceive to themselves damnation.” 


“For rulers are not a terror 
to good works, but to the evil.” 


“Wilt thou then not be afraid 
of the power?” 


keep peace will depend on how 
much of the grace of God 
“lieth in you.” “Avenge not 
yourselves, but rather give 
place unto wrath... vengeance 
is mine; I will repay, saith the 
Lord.” 

“Therefore if thine enemy 
hunger, feed him, if he thirst 
give him to drink”—don’t starve 
him out. 


262 


“Do that which is good, and 
thou shalt have praise of the 
same.” 


“For he is the minister of 
God to thee for good, But if 
thou do that which is evil, be 
afraid, for he beareth not the 
sword in vain.” 


“For he is the minister of 
God, a revenger to execute 
wrath upon him that doeth evil.” 


“Wherefore ye must needs be. 


subject, not only for wrath, but 
also for conscience sake. For 
this cause pay ye tribute also: 
for they are God’s ministers, 
attending continually upon this 
very thing. 


“Render therefore to all their 
dues: tribute to whom tribute is 
due: custom to whom custom: 
fear to whom fear: honor to 
whom honor.” 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


“Overcome evil with good”— 
not with gunpowder. 

“Owe no man anything but 
to love one another.” 

“Thou shalt not commit 
adultery’—War winks at it. 

“Thou shalt not kill”—the 
sixth commandment was broken 
about six million times during 
the war. 

“Thou shalt. not steal”—ex- 
cept from the “enemy.” 

“Thou shalt not bear false 
witness”’—soldiers may tell all 
the lies they like to the “enemy.” 

“Thou shalt not covet,’—most 
wars are a fight for the be- 
longings of others. 

“Thou shalt love thy neigh- 
bor as thyself’—war says, “hate 
your neighbor and love your-. 
self.” 

“Love worketh zo ill to his 
neighbor’—war works nothing 
else but “all.” 


Passages taken from 1 Peter 2; 11:24 


“Submit yourselves to every 
ordinance of man for the Lord’s 
sake: whether it be to the King 
as supreme; or unto the gover- 
nors, as unto them that are sent 
by him for the punishment of 
evil doers, and for the praise 
of them that do well. For so 
is the will of God. Honor the 
king.” 


“As strangers and pilgrims” 
—‘‘strangers” and “pilgrims” 
have no earthly land to die and 
slay for. 

“That with well doing ye 
may put to silence the ignorance 
of foolish men”—not with fight- 
ing. 

“As free, ... as the servants 
of God’—not as the slaves of 
ungodly and earthly men? 

“Honor all men. Love the 
brotherhood. Fear God”—not, 
kill the foreigner, hate your 
enemy, disobey God. 

“For this is thankworthy, if a 
man for conscience toward God 
endure grief, suffering wrong- 
fully ... if when ye do well 
and suffer for it, ye take it 
patiently, this is acceptable with 
God”—not if you avenge your- 
self and others for wrongs by 
hitting back. 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


263 


“For even hereunto were ye 
called: because Christ also suf- 
fered for us, leaving us an ex- 
ample, that ye should follow 
his steps: Who, when he was 
reviled reviled not again; 
when he suffered, he threatened 
not; but committed himself to 
him that judgeth righteously 
. . . by whose stripes ye were 
healed’—then when  “ordi- 
nances of men’ bid us do the 
opposite of all this we are not 
to obey them. 


Passages taken from 1 Timothy 2:1-8 


“TY exhort therefore, that, first 
of all, supplications, prayers, 
intercessions, and giving of 
thanks, be made for all men; 
for kings and for all that are 
in authority; that we may lead 
a quiet and peaceable life in 
all godliness and honesty. For 
this is good and acceptable in 
the sight of God our Saviour.” 


“For all men’—we are to 
love and pray for all men as 
well as “the king” and “those 
in authority.” Can’t pray for 
them and shoot them. 

“That we may live a qutet 
peaceable life’—not engage in 
a roaring, riotous war. 

“In all godliness and hon- 
esty”—not possible in war. 


“God our Saviour who will 
have all men to be saved’— 
then how can I do His will and 
send them unprepared to hell? 


“Whereunto I am ordained a 
preacher and an apostle... 
a teacher’—not a man-slayer. 


“T will therefore that men 
pray everywhere lifting up holy 
hands, without wrath and 
doubting”—prayer and bayonet- 
sticking absolutely opposed. In 
battle men lift up bloody hands 
impelled by passion which is 
fostered by doubt and suspic- 
10n.” 


Passages in Titus 2:6-143 3:1-5 


“Put them in mind to be sub- 
ject to principalities and 
powers, to obey magistrates.” 


“Young men likewise exhort 
to be sober minded’”—sobriety 
and the rage of fighting don’t 
go together. One must lose 
his temper before he can prop- 
erly thrust his sword. 


264 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


“In all things showing thy- 
self a pattern of good works” 
—not crouching in earth works 
waiting to rip your brother up 
the bowels, that isn’t a “good 
work.” 

“Uncorruptness, gravity, sin- 
cerity, sound speech”—corrup- 
tion, levity, lying and _ blas- 
phemy are outstanding features 
of all barracks and trenches. 

“Having no evil thing to say 
of you”’—never being able to 
say that you ever committed 
murder—killed any one. 

“Not purloining’—loot and 
robbery are frequent in war. 

“The grace of God... hath 
appeared, ... teaching us that 
denying all ungodliness and 


worldly lusts’—but all armies © 


are for the most part, godless 
and they have filled Europe 
with dishonored girls and war- 
babies. 

“We should live _ soberly, 
righteously and godly”—how is 
this possible while men are 
hating and killing each other? 


“Looking ... for our Saviour 
Jesus Christ’—nobody looks for 
Jesus Christ when on the look- 
out for the enemy. A battle- 
field is the last place in the 
world where the generals want 
to see Jesus. 


“Who gave himself for us” 
—so are we to give ourselves 
for others even when they 
wrong and ill-treat us. 


“A peculiar people zealous of 
good works—ready to every 
good work’—zealous in doing 
good, not in spreading death 
and destruction. 


“To speak evil of no man’— 
with armies it is “disloyalty” 
to speak anything but “evil” of 
the “enemy.” 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 265 


“No brawlers”—every battle 
charge is a yelling, screaming, 
Swearing, raging rampage. 

“But gentle, showing all 
meekness unto all men’”—of all 
things in this universe the most 
despicable to a camp of armed 
men is “gentleness” and “meek- 
ness.” The only kind of “sub- 
missiveness” armies believe in 
is not that which is shown 
“unto all men” but to the few 
officers to whom the common 
soldier is required to sign away 
his soul. 


Justifiable Disobedience 


Surely any unprejudiced mind, honestly seeking the truth, 
will perceive that, whatever kind of obedience to earthly 
governments the passages so ardently quoted from these 
chapters by war advocates may imply, they cannot mean, 
that the Christian is to render such an obedience as involves 
the breach of many far stronger and more important in- 
junctions, with which such passages are inseparably asso- 
ciated. The Scriptures, then, which require our obedience 
to earthly authority must be interpreted by, and subordinated 
to, those others which demand a still stricter obedience to 
heavenly authority. We know also that Scripture cannot 
contradict itself. 

But more, these greatly-relied-upon passages indicate in 
themselves what kind of authority it is Christians are to obey. 
Let us refer first to those in Romans thirteen. The “rulers” 
they are to obey “are not a terror to good works but to evil.” 
Of course, then, it could not mean that if some Nero was to 
command the saints to worship idols, or tell them to go and 
kill each other, that they were to obey him in doing that. 
Again, the power of which we are to “be afraid” is to be of 
such a nature that if we do “that which is good,” we shall 
“have praise of the same; which is another way of saying, 
that should the power tempt us by its “praise” to do what is 


66 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


bad, we are not to yield to it. Further, the power to which 
we owe allegiance is “the minister of God .. . for good,” and 
the fact that “he beareth not the sword in vain,” is to make 
us “afraid” when we “do that which is evil.” He is “the 
minister of God to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.” 
But the Apostle could never have meant to imply that we 
were to allow governments to make us “afraid” to do good 
and to refuse to do wrong. It was His own disobedience to 
such authorities which led them to cast him into prison and 
ultimately to cut off his head! , 
Concerning the passage in Peter’s First Epistle. The 
war advocate’s texts are also sufficiently self-interpretive. 
The “ordinances of men” to which the Christian is to sub- 
mit, are those which he can obey—“for the Lord’s sake.” It 
is evident, then, that if an “ordinance” demands that he 
should strike his enemies when Christ told him he was not 
to resist but to love them, he could not obey such an ordi- 
nance as that—‘for the Lord’s sake.” Again the “governors” 
Christ’s followers are to obey are those sent “‘for the punish- 
ment of evil doers” and for “the praise of them that do well’ 
according to the “will of God.’ He is therefore NOT to 
follow their dictates when they would praise him for dis- 
obeying God, any more than he is to fear them when they 
punish him for doing good, in other words, when he refuses 
to commit murder. So it will be seen that the command 
to “honor the king” cannot mean that a Christian is to go 
to war at his behest, for in doing that he would be disobey- 
ing all the “qualifying clauses’ which surround this in- 
junction. 
Those who preach the doctrine of absolute and indiscrimi- 
nating obedience to earthly governments should remember 
that this argument proves a good deal too much for the bene- 
fit of their case, because it is just as applicable to the soldiers 
of an opposing army. [If it is incumbent on English, French 
and American Christians to go to war because God requires 
them to obey their rulers, it must be equally right for Ger- 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 267 


man and Austrian Christians to do the same. In this case 
we are confronted with the grotesque spectacle of one set of 
Christians marching out in obedience to the Word of God, 
to slay another set of Christians whose sole offense against 
their opponents is that they are doing exactly the same thing! 
Scripturally defended unquestioning obedience to King 
George or the President is just as applicable to Kaisers. 


Bad Laws Repealed by Punishments They Inflict 


And yet always bear carefully in mind that although we, 
with the Apostles Paul and Peter, are not only justified in 
so doing, but are also required by the law of our allegiance 
to our heavenly King always to disobey earthly leaders when 
they require of us any unfaithfulness to Christ, yet we are 
not to resist them. Non-compliance is one thing resistance 
is quite another. ‘The Apostles, with all the martyrs and 
saints, have been called to disobey earthly powers and poten- 
tates, but they never resisted them. Hence, they never 
dishonored the function of government which is “ordained of 
God.” 

There are two ways in which the principle of law and 
order can be upheld. It can, under the administration of 
God-fearing rulers, be supported by obedience to their be- 
hests, in which case those doing so will “have praise of the 
same;” or it can, under the administration of wicked rulers, 
be upheld by willingly and without resistance suffering for 
an intelligent and conscientious refusal to comply with evil. 
In one case the law is honored by obedience, in the other 
by patient endurance of the penalty attached to its breach. 
Even the criminal, when he emerges from jail after a ten- 
year incarceration has, by his endurance of punishment, 
honored the law. By such suffering on the part of the right- 
eous many evil rulers have been overthrown and many bad 
laws have been repealed. When, therefore, as Christians, 
we are asked by temporal rulers to arm ourselves and go out 
to kill others, we are to reply in the words of Peter— 


268 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


“Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto 
you more than unto God, judge ye’—“We ought to obey 
God rather than men.”! ‘That is to say, we put the respon- 
sibility back on such rulers for their unjust rulership and 
refuse to obey them. But we are at the same time to sub- 
mit patiently and unresistingly to the penalties placed upon 
us for our disobedience. ‘Thus we honor, if not the right- 
eous law of God, yet the principle of law in the world which 
is by God, and though there is, of course, nothing of the 
marvelous merit in our suffering that there was in that of 
Christ, yet we support that principle, even as He did, when 
He went unresistingly to die at the hands of wicked men. 

Personally I have been privileged to see this policy worked 
out, with all the success the Lord has promised should fol- 
low it, in the earlier days of the Salvation Army, days when 
our splendid antagonism to the spirit of the world brought us 
into the real zone of fighting- with the powers of evil. I 
have myself, as others have done scores of times, inten- 
tionally broken the ordinance of a city, by preaching in the 
open air in order to get the laws repealed which closed the 
streets to the proclamation of the Gospel. While we always, 
when we could, threw back the onus of our imprison- 
ment upon the authorities by testing, in the higher courts, 
the constitutional soundness of the by-laws under which we 
were prosecuted, we always joined with our pleading the as- 
surance that we were willing to suffer, since we appreciated 
the principle of the law. And the fact that we had patiently 
and cheerfully suffered imprisonment always aided our 
case, sometimes with the judges, frequently with magistrates, 
who on some occasions have been so troubled as to rise from 


4 


their beds to pay the fines they themselves had imposed, thus 


liberating the victims of their own judgments. 


earthly “patriotism” infringes upon the greater obligations of 
the coming kingdom we are always at all costs to stand for 


1Acts 4:19; 5:20. 


i 
g 


As Christians, then, whenever the requirements of our 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 269 


our heavenly King. His commands must be supreme. For 
Jesus Himself said ‘Heaven and earth shall pass away, but 
my words shall not pass away.” The counsel of pre- 
dominant importance to all who wish to follow His banner 
in the matter of our relationships with earthly powers, He 
gave us Himself when He said—‘“‘Seek ye FIRST the king- 
dom of God and HIS righteousness.’ 


The Lord Jesus and Theodore Roosevelt 


Further, we must not forget that the “patriotism” of the 
Christian is not confined to his own country. His sym- 
pathies go out toward all nations, for members of all nation- 
alities are in the Kingdom of God. Most of the “patriotism” 
of this godless world is nothing but a thoroughly anti-Chris- 
tian, narrow, selfish, greedy spirit. ‘That spirit is respon- 
sible for nearly all wars. If it was not so wicked it would 
be laughable. To see people puffing themselves up with a 
vain imagination that their particular race and the portion 
of the globe which it happens to occupy is immensely su- 
perior to all other races and all other lands, is absurd enough; 
but to travel the world, as I have, and see every nation doing 
the same thing, is painfully ridiculous. 

This spirit of exclusiveness was most accurately voiced in 
a war-time speech delivered by the late and lamented Theo- 
dore Roosevelt, who, when offering himself for a third-term 
presidency, gave out this message to the American people: 


“Don’t be for me unless you are prepared to say that every 
citizen of this country has got to be pro-United States, first, last 
and all the time, and no pro-anything else at all, and that we 
stand for every good American everywhere, whatever his birth- 
place or creed, and wherever he now lives, and that in return we 
demand that he be an American and nothing else, with no hyphen 
about him. Every American citizen must be an American first 
and for no other country even second, and he hasn’t any right 
to be in the United States at all if he has any divided loyalty be- 
tween this and any other country. I don’t care a rap for the 
man’s creed or birthplace so long as he is straight United States, 
and if he isn’t I’m against him.” 


1Matt. 24:35. Matt. 6:33. 


270 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


From the viewpoint of this world’s policy, such talk may 
be excellent “patriotism,” but most certainly it is not Chris- 
tianity. I say this of Mr. Roosevelt with all due respect for 
his record, his exalted station, and for the friendship he 
manifested toward the family to which I belong. But I say 
it boldly, because it is teaching of the kind expressed in this: 
speech which has flooded the world with selfishness and 
barred off man from man by barriers of misunderstanding, 
envy and hatred. 


Pro-Christians versus Pro-Americans 


Such national self-inflation is doubtless excellent diplomacy 
for governments whose policy may be described by the say- 
ing, “Every nation for itself and the Devil take the hind- 
most,” but most decidedly it is not the spirit of the Church, 
whose rule for nations, as for men, is, “Thou shalt love thy 
neighbor as thyself.” Jesus, the King of the Jewish nation— 
which of all nationalities had most right to exclusiveness— 
never said, ‘“Don’t be for me unless you are prepared to say 
that every Jew has got to be pro-Israelite first, last and all 
the time, and no pro-anything else at all.” He didn’t say, 
“Every Jewish citizen must be a Jew first, and for no other 
country even second,” nor did He say that he didn’t “care 
a rap for a man’s creed so long as he is a straight Jew.” On 
the contrary, He gave the privileges of the chosen people 
to “every nation.” He loved to call Himself “the Son of 
Man”—man regardless of birthplace, race, or color. ‘They 
all had the same claim upon His love and a like interest in 
His great sacrifice. For this very reason the Lord was not 
by any means so unconcerned about a man’s creed as Mr. 
Roosevelt seemed to be. With Him what a man believed 
concerning the redeeming work of the Cross, and how he 
obeyed the commands of God’s only begotten Son, were mat- 
ters of infinitely greater importance than any question of 
national politics could ever be. For a Christian, then, the 
very thought of blowing off a man’s head because he hap- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 271 


pened to be a “foreigner,” is horrible. He believes that 
God “hath made of one blood all nations of men.’ He is 
not tied to any one flag. He finds it nowhere recorded 
in the Bible that he is not to be a loyal subject of Germany, 
or Austria, France, England, Italy, or the United States. 
But he does find there how excellent it is to be “all things to 
all men,”? and without any shadow of a doubt he does dis- 
cover that the Scriptures forbid him to be a murderer. 
From this standpoint also the “patriotism” of those who com- 
pose the Kingdom of God—the citizens of which are of all 
nationalities—is an infinitely more exalted patriotism than 
that which sees little but its own nation’s interests; 
grows rich with blood-money amassed by the misery of other 
people’s horrors; and then flies into rage and into arms 
immediately its own citizens are injured or its own trade is 
interfered with. If you must have war, and wish to be 
guided as much as possible by the teachings of Christ, it is 
better to fight to right the other fellow’s wrongs than your 
own. 


1Acts 17:26. *1Cor. 9:22. 


Ill. WAR IS UNPATRIOTIC FOR THE CHRIS- 
TIAN BECAUSE FOR THE CHRISTIAN TO 
DESTROY HIS FELLOW-CHRISTIAN 
IS THE HIGHEST FORM OF 
TREASON TO CHRIST | 


As I have already reminded you, it is a strict rule of 
earthly nations, that citizens should have the protection of 
their governments in the pursuit of lawful rights. Hence, 
we saw the United States going to war with Germany partly 
and ostensibly because a handful of her hundred millions of 
subjects, sailing in belligerent ships, had fallen upon disaster. 


Wherever a reputable citizen of an earthly power may 


go he is supposed to take with him the protection of his 
nation. He is part of the body politic. Any insult suffered 
by him is shared, and is to be avenged by his government. 
But for fellow-citizens of the same country to kill each other 
is the rankest murder. For soldiers of the same army, fight- 
ing for the same government, to turn upon each other—and 
more especially to do so in the presence of the enemy—would 
be the worst kind of traitorship, punishable by instantaneous 
shooting. 
The Body of Christ 


But how much more important it must be to maintain this 
principle in relation to the Kingdom of God and the Church 
of Christ. The Christian is not only a citizen of Christ’s 
kingdom, he is a member of “the Church which is His 
body.’+ That “Body,” though composed of many members, 
is “one in Christ Jesus.” Wherever there is a humble be- 
liever in the Saviour there is a part of the sacred Body of 
the Lord. ‘For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one 
body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles.”? How, then, can 


1Eph. 1:22, 23. #1 Cor, 12:13. 


272 


| 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 273 


a Christian destroy any part of that Body of which he is a 
member himself, and of which Christ is the head, without 
making himself guilty of the highest treason to his Lord and 
his King? 

Impossible! 

For two members of the Body of Christ to meet on the 
crest of a trench and pierce each other through with the 
bayonet, would be an outrageous crime against the very per- 
son of the Son of God, Who we know, in some mysterious 
way, dwells in each of His believing children. They con- 
stitute the limbs of that spiritual organism which is His 
Church, and to destroy them is to injure Him—to retard 
His work and to hinder His opportunity for expressing Him- 
self in the world. 

No truth in the New Testament is more precious or more 
wonderful than the relationship of the Heavenly Father to 
His children on earth. No judgment ever on the lips of 
Christ was more severe than that which He hurled at those 
who injured or persecuted His people. “It is impossible 
but that offenses will come: but woe unto him through whom 
they come!’* If such a judgment threatens the ungodly 
for their ill-treatment of the saints, where will the righteous 
who kill their brother Christians appear? 


Mutual Murder 


What could be more monstrous than that members of the 
_ Christian Endeavour or the Young People’s Societies, whose 
glory has been that they knew no national boundaries, no 
racial prejudices, should be shooting each other down like 
rabbits? ‘Think how many members of the Y. M. C. A. 
have, despite their bond of universal brotherhood, marched 
out from Association Huts in the opposing camps and shot 
each other dead, or sent each other to the hospitals as crip- 
ples for life. Just try and estimate the wickedness of two 
soldiers of the Salvation Army, that movement which, perhaps 


Luke 17:1. 


274 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


more than any other in modern times, has trained its people 
to love and serve, with an equal fervor, the citizens of all 
nations, just imagine the iniquity of displaying all their 
wonted enthusiasm in trying to blow each other to pieces! 
and yet, during the war, I read in the War Cry, a letter to 
the President of the United States in which the boast was 
made that thirty thousands Salvationists were actively en- 
gaged at the different fronts in Europe. In a war-time issue 
of the American War Cry, I saw also an enthusiastic glorifi- 
cation of the deeds of a certain Salvation Army color sergeant, 
who was also a provost sergeant in the Canadian military 
army. ‘This brother was much praised because he had suc- 
ceeded in “signing up” fifteen hundred and six men for 
service, not under the dear old flag of that movement still 
precious to me and which, in my memory, stands for the 
good fight of faith, but for the carnal, bestial fray of the 
trenches. ‘This is indeed strange, for the “Army” as I knew 
it, and still love to think of it, stands for victory by salva- 
tion not for conquest by damnation. 

It cannot then have been God’s will that the Christians of 
England, Germany, Austria, Italy, France, America, should 
have been killing each other. But this they have been doing 
before our eyes and that, not only without protest from 
their leaders, but often at their instigation. Thousands 
of Churches, it must be said with sorrow, have been little 
better than recruiting stations for a system which has flung 
the Gospel to the winds and openly advocates salvation for 
the world’s wrongs by brute force. 

In this connection it is worthy of note that when, at the 
close of this dispensation, the Lord with His saints ‘“‘shall 
be revealed from heaven in flaming fire’ to make war on 
the offending nations at the final battle of Armageddon, the 
Rapture will already have taken place and the members, of 
His Body, being translated, will not be found attacking each 
other, but having been arrayed on His side, will return with 
Him to destroy His enemies and capture the world for His 
dominion. 


— 


IV. WAR IS ALSO UNPATRIOTIC FOR THE 
‘CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS AN ACT OF 
FLAGRANT DISLOYALTY TO THE BIBLE 
FOR CHRISTIANS TO KILL AND DIE 
FOR NATIONS ALREADY DOOMED 
TO DESTRUCTION 


Here I desire to say a word specially applicable to those 
“Bible Student”? Movements, Bible Institutes and Con- 
ferences which have, during the last fifty years, made 
prophecy and premillennial truth a special feature of their 
teaching. In all their instruction there is nothing they 
have more emphasized than the predicted destruction of the 
kingdoms of this world. ‘The rock-bottom foundation of 
the whole prophetic argument, so far as it relates to the 
“times of the end’—the point at which all calculations 
begin—is the image of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream as inter- 
preted by Daniel—“Thou, O king, art this head of gold.’”? 
‘That image from the head downward represents a succes- 
sion of empires culminating in ten kingdoms, represented by 
its ten toes and, according to this teaching, these kingdoms, 
which are of an unstable mixture of “iron and clay,” are 
destined to fall to pieces and finish in utter destruction. 


The Test for Bible Teaching 


Very well, then, the time has now come for those who 
teach these things to practice this doctrine when it is going 
to cost them something to do it. If these kingdoms in the 
midst of which we are living are in reality the unstable and 
vanishing quantities we say they are—if they are truly 
doomed to utter demolition—then under what obligation is 
the child of God, the pioneer of that Everlasting Kingdom of 


1Dan. 2:38. 
275 


276 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


the soon-coming Sovereign Lord of the universe—under 
what obligation is he to lay down his life, already consecrated 
to the service of his Saviour, to help bolster up their totter- 
ing foundations? 


What are we to say of those who with eloquent voice and 
convincing writings—those who have founded schools and 
issued magazines largely on this and kindred truths—when, 
immediately a government or a president proclaims war, on 
account of matters which are purely of this age and which 
concern the interests of these doomed nations—what shall 
we say of these champions of prophetic truth, if they “throw 
up the sponge” and join in the general hullabaloo for 
“patriotism !” 


Never Mind the Wreck, Save the Passengers 

So far as I can see, there is no escape from the conclusion, 
that the very arguments which prove the approaching end 
of this age and the premillennial coming of the Lord prove 
also that war is, in this age, forbidden for the enlightened fol- 
lower of Christ. He is not to give his life and take the lives 
of others to save the nations represented by the toes of 
Daniel’s image from going to pieces! God has decreed that 
the kingdoms of this age shall be wound up in flame and 
fury. The Christian’s supreme business is, not to help the 
governments—whether they be heartless autocracies or 
obedient servants of godless majorities—in their futile at- 
tempts to extinguish war-flames by adding more war-fuel to 
the furnace. ‘Their duty, as the Apostle Jude explains, 
is “pulling men out of the fire’+ and quenching the flare of 
envy with the “water of life.” ‘Their business is not recruit- 
ing armies to uphold autocracies or even democracies, but to 
arrest the attention of apostate Churches and God-forgetting 
nations with the startling proclamation—‘“The Kingdom of 
God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.”* “Be- 
hold, the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints to 


1Jude 23. *Mark 1:15. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 277 


execute judgment upon all that are ungodly.” To change 
the metaphor, this old world is already wrecked, and it is 
the first duty of its Christian sailors to see that all their 
energies are spent in such enterprise as will enable their 
fellow-travelers to so live on the ship that when she goes 
under they may get into the life boats. Any justifiable 
means to this end should be employed, but Christians are not 
to be prostituting their powers in tinkering at the machinery 
of the vessel, which, however excellent in the sight of men 
it may be, is already doomed to sink. 


1Jude 14:15. 


V. WAR IS UNPATRIOTIC FOR THE CHRIS- 
TIAN BECAUSE IT CAN NEVER BE RIGHT 
FOR HIM TO EMPLOY A WICKED 
MEANS EVEN FOR SECURING 
A GOOD END 


I must now say something in reply to a very strong argu- 
ment raised in opposition to the contention of these addresses 
and in support of war. We are asked to consider what 
those wars which are called “righteous” wars have accom- 
plished in the history of the world. ‘The deliverances from 
bondage, victory over tyranny, the progress of “democracy,” 
are quoted as evidences of the good accomplished by the use 
of the sword. 


Christianity Never Properly Tried 


Supposing all this to be true, it proves nothing more than 
that the sword has accomplished, in a clumsy and brutal 
manner, what Christianity has been given no opportunity to 
do. While we know what have been the triumphs over these 
evils by the employment of force, we do not know what 
might have been the still greater triumphs over them had the 
principles of Christ been put to the test. We cannot say 
what Christianity would have accomplished for the world in 
its entirety, because Christianity, of the real kind, in its uni- 
versal application has never yet been tried. You cannot 
look for the perfect results of properly applied Christianity 
in a world which “lieth in wickedness.” If the whole world — 
had accepted Christ, if it had known the regenerating, ener- 
gizing power of His spirit, there would have been no need | . 
for the tremendous upheavals, the bloody strifes which men, : 
in their carnal struggles, have resorted to for temporal 
liberty. ‘This is obviously so for the simple reason that the 

278 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 279 


wrongs which oppressed them, and which called forth those 
struggles, would never have existed. 


In a world which as it neared the close of the age, Christ 
told us would more and more come under the influence of 
the Devil, you cannot expect to see the principles which He 
inculcated completely put into operation. You can’t look 
for millennial conditions in a pre-millennial dispensation. 
When Jesus comes back to reign in this world and His 
scepter is supreme, then we shall see aboundantly realized the 
triumphs of His doctrine. This old world will then become 
what it might have been, had all mankind accepted His 
offered salvation and put into practice the principles of His 
Sermon on the Mount. 


This, however, must not be forgotten, those great prin- 
ciples of justice, of liberty, of benevolence, which even a 
wicked world has come to see are best for the interests of 
mankind, for the establishment of which men have drawn 
the sword, are themselves the principles of Jesus. They 
have proved themselves mightier than the sword in. that 
they were the all-powerful incentives which prompted men 
to use it. Although, from the Christian standpoint, the for- 
bidden means were used to bring about these righteous ends, 
God has mercifully overruled “the wrath of man to praise 
Him’ in bringing about blessings for mankind which were 
not, after all, so much the results of war as they were the 
fruits of the unresisting suffering of His Son on the cross. 


Good Ends Do Not Justify Bad Means 
But this does not justify the CHRISTIAN in disobeying 


his Lord concerning the methods of his warfare, which is a 

warfare of faith. Whatever worldly men have accomplished 

by other means is neither here nor there, his plain duty is to 

do as his Master told him and to overcome evil with good, 

not with fury and chemical compounds. A criminal is not 

justified in committing murder because his victim is a bad 
1Psa. 76:10, 


280 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


man and a tyrant, and because by his death good people will 
come into possession of his inheritance. The Christian is 
not to do “evil that good may come.’”! The character and 
weapons of his warfare have been clearly written down for 
him throughout the entire pages, not only of the New Testa- 
ment, but when “rightly divided,’ throughout the whole 
Bible, and he must at all costs stand by them. Nor must 
we forget that the marvels accomplished—briefly referred 
to in these addresses—(see pages 84 to 92) by those who have 
had the courage to put into practice the behests of Christ, are 
all the more wonderfully convincing because they were 
applied in a world ruled by sinful men on selfish principles. 


Cromwell’s Gory Gospel 


But let us look a little more clo-zly into this aspect of the 
question. Are we so sure that the sword deserves all the 
credit it is given as regards those particular epochs in his- 
tory? Who, for instance, as a Christian, can study thought- 
fully the published biographies of the great Oliver Crom- 
well—especially Thomas Carlyle’s reproduction of his “let- 
ters and speeches,” the greatest tribute literature has yet 
paid him—without mingling with his admiration a sense 
of revulsion. One reads with a shudder how he went 
through Britain with fire and sword in the name of the 
gentle Saviour, and spoke of one of the bloodiest battles of 
history as “a crowning mercy.” But the “crowning mercy” 
was not at Worcester, it was at Calvary. Had Cromwell 
lived on the other side of the Cross, as a Jewish hero, one 
could understand it; but his rejoicings over slaughter are 
strikingly out of harmony with Christ’s appreciations of 
love as the power which was to transform the world. If 
Cromwell had known the proper method of Bible study as 
well as he knew its texts, he would have understood that the 
Kingdom of Christ cometh not by pikes and sabers. He 
would have perceived how, by a Spirit-possessed tongue 


1Rom. 3:8. 


es 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 281 


of fire, he could have accomplished more for the God he so 
truly revered than was possible of achievement by all his 
merciless “ironsides.” In that case poor Ireland, too, would 
have had a less bitter heritage than he left her! Thus we 
only know what Cromwell did with the sword—we do not 
know what he might have done had he relied only upon the 
Gospel. 


Would Patience Have Accomplished It? 


Again it may be asked, “What about George Washington 
and the War of the Revolution? Wasn’t that a war which 
achieved something? Was it not justifiable? Was it not 
a shaking off of tyranny and injustice? I reply, it does not 
by any means follow that because those liberties were ob- 
tained by the sword that they could not have been obtained 
by measures of peace. I have ventured frequently to declare 
that they could and would have been so obtained. The 
policies of oppression which afflicted the early colonists of 
America were not the policies of the liberal and advancing 
statesmen of England. ‘They were the enactments of a 
strong-headed, narrow-minded, autocratic king, whose tongue 
could not properly speak the English language, and whose 
sympathies were foreign to the then rising tide of liberty in 
Britain, the mother of parliaments. No one who knows 
the political history of Britain and has studied the struggles 
of her brave people to lead the way for all nations in the 
path of political freedom, can for a moment believe that 
the great mass of her population would have supported, for 
long, a régime which denied to her kith and kin beyond the 
seas the same privileges which had been partially obtained, 
and a full measure of which were being fought for at home. 
Certainly her statesmen, like the great William Pitt, would 
not have done so. Most decidedly subsequent history has 
proved that such a procecure would have been impossible. 

The history of the British colonies in other parts of the 
world shows how possible it has been for nations just as 


282 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


free and independent—both as regards their institutions and 
their governments—as the United States, to grow up under 
the folds of the British flag, and that without firing a gun. 
Sometimes I think that had there been a little more patience 
and a bit more perseverance in exercising those wonderful 
gifts for negotiation, manifested by the leaders of the vari- 
ous colonies in straightening out their difficulties with each 
other, the injustice practiced by the Mother Country would 
have been peacefully overcome, and the United States would 
not only have been as happy to remain where it was as the 
great Dominion of Canada is today, but she might have 
been spared the horrors of the Civil War. In that case 
the British Empire might have exercised such an influence 
throughout the world, that no gun could have been fired 
without its permission. In the War of the Revolution, then, 
we only know what happened by the sword—we don’t know 
what might have been accomplished without it. 


Liberty and the Guillotine 

The same might be said of the French Revolution. When, 
in 1789, the States General of France were in a perfectly 
peaceful way advancing the principles of freedom and jus- 
tice; when Louis XVI had surrendered to its demands and 
everybody thought the Revolution was accomplished, war 
intruded itself on the scene and brought with it a train of 
suspicions, jealousies and hatreds. ‘The Reign of ‘Terror 
followed, with its gruesome guillotine and all its orgies of 
blood, which have left a crimson stain on the page of French 
history yet to be exhibited and requited before the Great 
White Throne. The one memory about the French Revolu- 
tion which all but pollutes the mind is the use it made of the 
sword. We only know what was accomplished that way, 
we do not know what might have been wrought by persever- 
ance in the methods of peace. 


I'HE SAINT AND THE SWORD 283 


Civil and International War 


One more example of this argument I must refer to, which 
in America is a very telling one. What about Abraham 
Lincoln and the war for the liberation of the slaves? We 
answer: First. Speaking strictly according to facts, this 
was not war in the ordinary or generally understood sense. 
It was not a war of nation against nation, executed without 
authority in the way I have previously explained (see page 
114). It was an internal war, a civil war between parties 
who were parts of the same constitution, and it was decided 
upon after much discussion by representatives of the peoples 
concerned and by judicial decisions. ‘There was a sense in 
which President Lincoln had good reason for regarding the 
Southern revolt as a national police affair, calling for sol- 
diers who, as in the days of Christ in the Roman Empire, 
acted more as the preservers of the peace than as aggressive 
fighters. ‘This is the more so because back of that revolt 
lay the sinister, though profitable, trade in slaves. It was the 
knowledge that the abolition of slavery was involved which 
doubtless helped Lincoln round the difficult corners with 
his conscience, when at times he must have considered that, 
had the matter of secession been the sole issue, there was 
not much to choose between the convention at Montgomery 
attempting to throw off the dominion of Washington and 
the convention at Philadelphia attempting to throw off the 
dominion of London. He might justly have argued that 
while independence, where the people concerned wished it 
was a rock-bottom principle of the American Constitution, it 
was by no means an independence fo perpetuate slavery which 
was guaranteed. Otherwise, there would, after all, have 
been no very great reason for calling Robert E. Lee a rebel 
while regarding George Washington as a hero. 


284 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


What Might Have Been 


But mind I do not justify, from the Christian standpoint, 
the Civil War on this account. Though I may be saying 
what is intensely unpopular, I wish to stay with my Lord 
even here. I don’t believe He would have had Christians 
settle even the slave question in that way. I don’t for a 
moment believe that it was either the best or the only way 
to settle it, and I venture further to say, that had the mat- 
ter of union not been so involved in the slave question, 
another way would have been found to settle it. | 

I have long thought—so strong is my admiration of the 
great and good Abraham Lincoln—that had he been Presi- 
dent of the United States one term sooner than he was, there 
would have been no Civil War at all. The animal had 
stampeded before he took the reins. 

Nor, in the second place, and applying the same argument 
as before used, do we know what might have been done had 
Lincoln refused, even then, to take the sword. Had he him- 
self gone down to face the revolting Confederate leaders, 
and better still the people of the South, with his powerful 
personality, his remarkable eloquence, and above all with 
the divine power which, in the employment of such peace- 
ful methods, God would surely have vouchsafed him. 


If Lincoln Had Known 


Moreover, we must not forget that back of all the causes 
for that war there were vested interests and commercial — 
considerations. Money power. ‘That power has been the 
motive spring, either directly or indirectly, of every war the 
Gentile nations have yet engaged in. It was commercial — 
interest which prompted the North to abandon slavery, just © 
as it was commercial interest which prompted the South to 
cling to it. Had President Lincoln known beforehand what 
was going to happen, would he not have preferred to draw — 
on the Treasury rather than on the Armory? I think so. ; 
Would he have drawn the sword? I think not. Had some 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 285 


prophetic voice whispered in his ear that before the sword 
was replaced in its scabbard six hundred and ten thousand 
men would lie stretched in death in the fields of war, and 
as many would be maimed for life; that reckoning all ex- 
penditures up to the present time, fifteen thousand millions 
of dollars would be spent; that the South would go down 
in ruin and blood—had he known all this, I firmly believe 
he would have chosen rather to offer the slave-holders five 
billions of dollars to liberate their two billion dollars worth 
of slaves; I believe they would have accepted the offer, that 
no gun would have been fired, and that the policy of non- 
resistance would have saved nearly a million lives. 


Slavery Was Bound to Go 

The trend of events as regards the slave traffic of the 
whole civilized world supports this contention. Slavery was 
bound to go. It was fast disappearing. ‘The sentiment of 
the English people was overwhelmingly against it. I do not 
believe that slave-grown cotton could have long continued 
to have been sold to English manufacturers. ‘The spirit of 
the Gospel was driving out a thing so accursed. Remember, 
there never would have been a “slave question,” either in 
the United States or anywhere else, but for the Cross of 
Christ. It was love, not force which created the prejudice 
against it. Slavery was abolished throughout the British 
Empire without war. Fifteen years of lawful agitation 
accomplished this deliverance. We must not forget that 
there are other names besides Lincoln’s which will be hon- 
ored wherever history will be read, on account of their 
association with the emancipation of the negro. ‘Thomas 
Clarkson and William Wilberforce—men whose memory 
is as precious to England as Lincoln’s is to America—were 
also great liberators of the colored races, but they never 
drew the sword. So once again we only know what Abra- 
ham Lincoln did by fighting, we don’t know what he would 


286 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


have accomplished had he stood resolutely to the policy of 
Christ, and relied only on the sword of the Spirit. 


Obedience Before Liberty 


But I have said this much rather to confirm than to estab- 
lish the case against war for the Christian. And I have 
answered these arguments only because they are used to 
oppose the contention that war is anfi-christian. It is the 
Christian’s attitude to war I am contending for, not that 
of the man of this world who knows nothing of the new 
birth. The Christian’s supreme authority is not Oliver 
Cromwell, or George Washington, or Abraham Lincoln but 
JESUS CHRIST. His first duty is to obey his Saviour. 
It is well for the Christian once for all to get the idea 
knocked out of his head that temporal advantages, pertain- 
ing entirely to this age, such as freedom, democracy, civiliza- 
tion, are ends to attain which he is justified in resorting to 
methods which are prohibited by Jesus Christ. It is a worse 
thing to disobey God than it is even to be a slave. ‘This is 
the teaching of the New Testament, some of which was 
addressed to the thousands of Christian slaves of the early 
Church, who were exhorted not to resist but to obey their 
masters “in the Lord,’ and wait patiently for the deliver- 
ances which His Gospel, during the age, and His ultimate 
appearance in His coming kingdom, would bring to them.’ 


Democracy and Theocracy 


As to the contention that the struggle for democracy justi- 
fies war for the Christian, we must bear well in mind that 
democracy, while it doubtless affords opportunities for 
spreading the Gospel which are sometimes, not by any 
means always, denied by autocracy, yet it is not in any 
sense Christianity. The two things are as distinct as the 


poles are apart. The wickedest countries in the world today 


are democracies. ‘(he freest countries on the globe are not 


‘4g \Cor. /ysax. , x) Tim, 652: 


—— 


THE SAINT AND. THE SWORD 287 


a whit more moral or religious than are the lands presided 
over by kings and emperors. In fact, there is frequently the 
most true piety where there is the greatest oppression. The 
devoutest Jews are the persecuted ones of the East. ‘There 
are more true brave saints in Armenia than in England. 
It is highly probable that the negroes of America were more 
religious and moral as slaves than they are today. No con- 
stitutions in the world are freer than the states of Aus- 
tralasia, and yet nowhere is immorality, especially juvenile 
immorality, more rampant. My own work in Australasia 
and my conversations with the statesmen of those lands con- 
cerning their social problems have abundantly convinced me 
of that. No empire existing can rival the United States 
for organized chicanery, political corruption, graft and 
divorce. ‘To create, then, even such splendid national consti- 
tutions as these, does not justify a follower of Christ in a 
course of disobedience. 


Fighting for a False Issue 


When I am asked to fight for the destruction of ‘Prus- 
sian militarism,” or “British navalism,”’ I ought to be sure 
of my ground. I ought to be certain that the world, should 
it cast off the yoke of militarism, would be more likely to 
turn from its sin and accept the Gospel than the United 
States has been. For the United States, which has known, till 
recently, nothing of the oppressive burden of ponderous armies 
and navies, has not on that account become any less wicked. 
When I am asked to lay down my life and kill my neighbor 
for a “great ideal,” that “ideal” being the establishment of 
a “world federation of peace,” as a Christian I cannot do 
so, for my Bible tells me distinctly that such a federation 
can and will never come till Jesus returns. ‘My chief busi- 
ness as a citizen of heaven is not to help bring in God-for- 
getting democracies, by aiding in the smashing of rotten au- 
tocracies, but to hasten the coming of the Kingdom of Christ. 


288 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


The kingdom which comes when Jesus comes—‘Even so 
come quickly Lord Jesus!” 


My Country 

I could not better express my patriotism as a Christian and 
my relationship to my country than by repeating the following 
words I have used elsewhere—‘“The Christian’s love for his 
fatherland will carry him a long way in the declarations he 
is prepared to make for his country. He will cry, ‘My coun- 
try, to serve its highest interests?’—Yes! My country, to 
live earnestly in it, to labor constantly for it?--Yes! My 
country, to enlighten and improve it?—Yes! My country, 
to sacrifice and suffer for it?—Yes! My country, to exhort 
and rebuke it?—Yes! But he will just as emphatically de- 
clare: ‘My country, to be a traitor to God for it?—No! 
My country, to lie and steal for it?-—No! My country, to 
debauch and commit adultery for it?--No! My country, 
to practice hate and revenge for it?—-No! My country, to 
commit murder for it?—Never!’ Pressed to the point of 
choosing between a so-called disloyalty to the land of his 
birth or adoption and obedience to the law of his Lord, the 
Christian will prefer to be counted false to his country that 
he may be true to God. He would rather be shot as a rene- 
geade and a traitor in the eyes of men than go, in defense of 
any earthly scepter, before the Great White Throne with 
hands strained by the blood of those for whom his Saviour 
died.” 


PART V 
WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
PROHIBITED BY THE TEACHINGS AND 
EXAMPLE OF CHRIST 





WAR IS ANTI-CHRISTIAN BECAUSE IT IS 
PROHIBITED BY THE TEACHINGS AND 
EXAMPLE OF CHRIST 


CoMING now to the application of all that has been said 
in these messages, what can the true Christian do to extricate 
himself from the false and dangerous position into which, 
by the force of circumstances around him, he has been 
driven? 

On the one hand, he sees the state, of which he is a loyal 
citizen, bringing all the pressure of influence, all the dignity 
of specially enacted law, all the dread of threatened punish- 
ment and all the terrors of armed authority, to compel him to 
ignore his Saviour’s words, and take up arms against his 
fellow-man. On the other hand, he sees the professed 
Church of Christ—aye even much of that portion of it 
which so loudly professes itself the exponent of the advanced 
Bible teaching and higher spiritual life—not only hopelessly 
involved in this colossal butchery, but vigorously taking 
sides with the contending nations in their suicidal strife. 
He hears passionate eloquence on the lips of the leaders of 
Christ’s people, exhorting him to play the man, buckle on 
his armor and, if necessary, die bravely in the trenches for 
“love of Emperor, King, President or Fatherland.” He is 
urged to help make the world “safe for democracy,” or to 
rally for a cause which every contestant asserts with equal 
emphasis is “holy and just.” ‘To say nothing of the flood- 
tide of arguments in the secular press he reads in almost 
every religious paper columns of war reports, articles full of 
plausible excuses for fighting, and stories filled with flattery 
for those who have done exploits in slaughtering their 
enemies, and filling the battle-fields with carrion. 

Amid all this what is the Christian to do? How can he 
find a way of escape? 

291 


292 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Back to Christ 
There is only one answer. ‘There can be only one answer. 


The Christian must go back to CHRIST. He must re- 
open his heart and his spiritual ears to hear, above all the 
distracting din of this world’s confusion of tongues, the 
voice of God in His eternal Word. He must go past all - 
earthly rulers, statesmen, theologians, Church dignitaries, 
even ministers of the Gospel; he must go past all human 
agents whatsoever “whose breath is in their nostrils,” past 
them all to the LORD JESUS CHRIST. He must seek 
out HIS teachings and the teachings of the Holy Ghost. 
through His Apostles, who laid down the principles of His 
Church. Despite all adverse circumstances, at all costs, 
notwithstanding threats of governments, even the scorn and 
excommunication of influential though apostate Churches, 
he must shape his conduct by the commands of the Bible, 
for Jesus said that heaven and earth shall pass away, but the 
words of God on the lips of His Son shall not pass away.* 

This is the issue of the hour and it is squarely up to every 
follower of Christ. Once more, he is required to choose be- 
tween the rulers of this world in their anti-christian policy 
of governing this earth, and Christ and His Christianity. 

We hear a great deal these days about “‘standing by” one’s 
Country, one’s King, one’s Emperor, one’s President, but | 
the Christian’s first duty is to stand by Jesus Christ. ‘The 
word of all the royal monarchs or exalted presidents on this 
globe, when they conflict with the commands of Christ, must, 
by the Christian, be unhesitatingly set aside. 

Let us then go back to our Saviour’s teaching concerning 
this war question. Let us consult the New Testament. 

What do we find there? After searching out all the utter- 
ances and acts of our Lord which have any bearing upon this 
question, we can discover nothing but the strongest condem- 
nation of war for His followers, except the war which is by 


1Matt. 24:35. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 293 


love with the weapons of the Spirit. His whole life and 
ministry, every word, every act, is the severest possible re- 
buke to the deceitful, devilish bloody business which has been 
going on before our eyes on the battle-fields of Europe. 

I have classified and grouped these passages together, 
paraphrasing the words of Jesus and the description of His 
acts, so as to make them read continuously, keeping as far 
as possible to the exact text of the gospels. 

Let us now examine them. First let us notice. 


I. THE QUALITIES HE ESTEEMED 


There was no quality of all those the Master commended 
more precious in His sight, more indispensable to the re-- 
ligion He taught His followers, than the quality of humility. 
This was essentially so because humility is the opposite to 
pride, and pride is the quality which in man so wrongly ad- 
justs him to his Saviour that, while he is possessed of it, he 
cannot be brought into saving relationship. 

But the one quality which above all others is incompatible 
with militarism is the grace of true humility. While I 
admit there may be, here and there, soldiers who, when not 
actually engaged in battle, are examples of modesty, yet 
meekness and soldiering are the very antithesis of each other. 
Fighters of all ranks—the higher the rank the more so—are 
encouraged, aye even urged to indulge and foster their pride. 
They must be inflated with national pride, with regimental 
pride, with pride of pomp and display, with pride of deport- 
ment and uniform, with swagger of arms and authority. An 
officer, from the lowest order to that of commander-in-chief, 
with all the insignia of rank and consciousness of power, 
strutting around with sword, spurs, epaulettes, decorations, | 
is as far removed a figure from that pictured for us in the 
New Testament of the humble, self-abasing servant of the 
Lord Jesus as could possibly be found. 


Consummation of Power and Pride 

Where indeed, in all this world, is there a calling so 
calculated to inflame the vanity, to pander to the pride of 
man, as the position of a great commander of armies in war- 
time? Some time back I stood on the summit of one of the 
highest peaks of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and placed my- 
self, in imagination, in supreme command of yast military 
forces around and beneath me. Standing erect with assumed 


294 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 295 


dignity, I threw about my person a staff of brilliant men, 
none of whom, at pain of death, might resist or even criticise 
my actions, every one of whom awaited with awe the slight- 
est utterance from my lips—the least sign from even a finger 
of my hand. At one such word—one such signal—they 
would leap to pass my command to other equally brilliant 
men who, standing with massed forces stretching along the 
valley at my feet, or at the head of regiments moving into 
positions on the hills, would instantly convert my sayings 
into the operations of a colossal battle, completely at the dis- 
posal of my will. In thought I realized that a million 
bayonets, in the grasp of a million hands, back of which 
there was the intelligence, the vigor of a million immortal 
spirits, were absolutely at my control. If I said, “No,” they 
retreated into silence and peace. If I said, “Yes,” they 
advanced to attack other equally enormous forces, with a 
clamor that reached the clouds and rent the air with shrieks 
of rage mingled with groans of pain. One command from 
me and a dozen silent peaks around would break into blazing 
fury, spitting all but volcanic fire on to the opposite heights. 
Another command, and half a dozen villages below would 
burst into flames. As I stood there, I thought of myself as 
one almost in the position of a little god. One who could say, 
“Let there be lightnings and thunder,” and a thousand guns 
would respond to my order; or, ‘Let there be fire,” and blaz- 
ing cities would signal the answer; or, “Let there be destruc- 
tion,” and the air would resound with revolving propellers, 
while the sky rained explosive damnation; or, “Let there be 
death,” and the “pale horse with his rider” would gallop 
through the contending masses, leaving the earth bestrewn 
with the slaughtered. I had only to cry, “Forward!” and a 
hundred thousand soldiers, every one of whom represented a 
whole circle of interests, home, wife, children, fathers, 
mothers, sweethearts—all would spring at the throats of 
other like multitudes for whom I had cultivated a diabolical 
hatred, who it was my ambition to smash, trample in the 


296 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


mud, kill, bury quickly out of my sight. One word of mine 
could convert that inexpressibly beautiful scene of blue-hazed 
mountains, timbered vales, placid streams, fields of abundant 
fertility, into a raging hell full of roaring hate, consuming 
fire, blackened cinders. It was I—J, the little insignificant 


speck standing out against the sky-line, under innumerable 


starry worlds, with my gold lace and little sword and pistol 
—it was I who could do all this. And worst of all, I could 
flatter my pride, while I was thus indulging it, with that 
Devil’s own dope for the conscience—the idea that I was 
directing all this visible damnation to effect some kind of 
salvation for the wrongs of this world. 


Christ and Humility 


Is it possible to conceive of any position in which mortal © 


man could more effectually display his love of glory, his 
lust for power, his disgusting pride? Could man ever be 
placed in a position which afforded so startling a contrast 
to the position of the Lord Jesus when He stood on the 
summit of another hill confronting the mockery of the mob, 
the shame of the cross—the cross where, with the utmost 
self-abasement and humiliation, He transacted the deed 
which can alone suffice for the world’s redemption? Im- 
possible! 


Nor can it be disputed that pride, more frequently than 


anything else, brings nations to battle and keeps them fight- 
ing long after the ultimate issue is a foregone conclusion. 

In further contrast to all the pompous vanity of militarism 
we have the Lord Jesus telling us that he who is to be great- 
est in the Kingdom of Heaven is he who humbles himself 
as a little child, and explaining as He takes these little ones 
in His arms, that “of such” we must be if we would enter 
His glory.2 He promises that the meek shall inherit the 
earth and that he who humbleth himself shall be exalted, 
while every one that exalteth himself shall be humbled,® for 


1Matt. 18:4. *Matt. 19:14. %Luke 14:11. 


LHE SAINT AND THE SWORD 297 


that which is exalted among men is an abomination in the 
sight of God. 

How can such qualities as the following, and which Jesus 
so strongly commended, be made to harmonize with the 
spirit and practice of fighting? He pledged His blessings to 
the poor in spirit?—not to the haughty high-spirited; to 
those who mourn over the world’s lost condition’—not to 
those who glory in its selfish achievements; to those who 
hungered and thirsted after righteousness‘—not those who 
fought for territory and trade; to the merciful’—not to the 
ingenious inflicters of pain; to those who suffered, were 
persecuted, hated, falsely accused in a righteous causeé— 
not those who tried to achieve good by smiting, bruising, and 
killing; to those who were at peace with each other,’ and 
who loved to be peacemakers*—not to those who, in pursuit 
of their rights, caused contention and scattered the seeds 
of strife. And chiefest among all the qualities which Jesus 
commended stands love, ‘These things I command you,” 
He says, “that ye love one another.’”® ‘A new command- 
ment give I unto you, that ye love one another.’?° By no 
process of argument could any enlightened Christian be 
brought to believe that he could kill his brother-man as an 
act of love. ‘The qualities, then, which Christ esteemed are 
those which are the very opposite to the spirit of war. 


Luke 18:14. Matt 5:3. *Matt. 5:4. ‘Matt. 5:6. SMatt. 5:7. Matt. 
§:10, 11. ™Mark 9:50. ®%Matt. 5:9. °John 15:17. ?°John 13:34. 


Il. THE PARABLES HE USED 


The parables spoken by the Lord Jesus give not the slight- 
est hint that military tactics or the use of force was ever in ™ 
His mind as a justifiable method for progressing His king- 
dom during this Church age. It is most significant that He 
never once employs any analogy, symbol or illustration which 
conveys the idea of the propagation of His cause by means 
of fighting. Only twice does He use a military figure in His 
parables and only once in His illustrations. And then 
always to convey truths antagonistic to war, as we shall 
presently see. Among the characters employed in His para- 
bles we have physicians, blind guides, wise and foolish build- 
ers, children, debtors, unclean spirits, sowers and reapers, 
scribes, good and bad shepherds, a good Samaritan, an im- 
portunate friend, a rich fool, a foolish farmer, a rich man, 
a poor beggar, waiting, wise, unprofitable and unmerciful 
servants, an unrighteous steward, a prodigal boy, and a 
hypocritical son, a just man and a thief, a wicked husband- 
man, a porter and ten virgins. All these, but only once in 
these parables is there any reference to force or to a soldier. 


Military Illustrations 

Let us look at the two military illustrations (for the mili- 
tary parable see page 324).1 They are of course purely illus- 
trations used to enforce truths which, so far are they from 
even seeming to justify war, would rather remove every 
conceivable cause for bloodshed by those who accept them. 
Let us deal with Luke XIV first. Jesus is speaking of the 
pre-eminence of His authority over all other authorities— 
the overmastering love for Him which as a passion in the 
human heart will place all other affections in a subordinate 
position to His overlordship. He is telling His hearers that 


Luke 14:25-35. Read all verses, Luke 11:21-23. 


298 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 299 


unless they are willing to forsake even the most sacred family 
affections, father, mother, husband, wife, children, brethren, 
sisters, “aye even his own life’ for His sake—that is, of 
course, for the sake of those doctrines which these same 
hearers had heard Him expound—they could not be His 
disciples. This is, of course, only another way of saying 
that unless a man is willing to surrender everything that 
ever makes war possible he cannot be the follower of Christ. 
For when one has already surrendered family ties and “all 
that he hath” in order to ally himself with the teaching of 
Christ in His Sermon on the Mount, he has not anything left 
in this world but these principles worth fighting for. Hence, 
the teaching of Jesus was: ‘Count the cost before making 
any light-hearted sentimental professions about being my dis- 
ciples, lest you be a hypocrite and fraud; lest you become like 
‘salt’! which, having ‘lost its savor,’ cannot be ‘salted’ and 
is neither fit for the land, nor the dunghill” but is “cast 
out.” To enforce THIS truth He uses this illustration of the 
king, who, He tells us, sat down to do exactly that which 
modern kings seldom dream of doing—what, in fact, they 
have little means for doing—when bursting with rage and 
“nuffed up” with pride, they declare war on each other; 
that is, sit down calmly and “count the cost.” It is a pretty 
sure thing that if governments would carefully calculate 
the cost of war, in lives and money, and make it known to 
the people, they would find such a computation to be the 
death blow to their schemes for raising armies of volunteer 
warriors, whose glories have been the theme of war poets 
and the pride of national history. ‘Counting the cost” of 
the late war has killed the “volunteer” system—the boast 
of all free countries—killed it dead as a door nail. What 
the people have learned concerning the “cost” of war has 
made it impossible to raise any more armies of unpressed 
men. It has brought about the, until now, hated conscrip- 
tion plan, by which men, instead of “leaping to the call of 


tLuke 14:34. 


300 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


their country,” etc., etc., etc., have to be “drafted” by resort 
to a system of wholesale gambling in lives, and at the peril of 
disgrace and imprisonment. The only bearing, then, this 
illustration can possibly have on war is: (1) That if you 
want to be a real follower of Jesus Christ you had better sit 
down and ‘“‘count the cost” before you profess anything 
of the kind, remembering that you must obey Him before 
all kings and presidents and be prepared to die rather than 
break His Sixth Commandment. (2) That it is better, even 
so far as kings are concerned, to “count the cost” before 
starting out to make war, and, (3) that “counting the cost” 
would probably lead to the “sending of an embassage” to 
make terms of peace before it starts—which is precisely the 
argument of all Christian non-resistants. 


The “Strong Man Armed” Argument 

The second example of what has been termed a military 
figure, is the simile of the strong man armed.’ It has, of 
course, nothing to do with militarism, but relates to healings, 
which are never wrought by violence of any kind. ‘The best 
way to prove this is to show the true meaning of the illustra- 
tion. It is employed, I think, to indicate the difference be- 
tween cures which are the result of satanic power and those 
which are the consequence of divine intervention. Our 
Lord is defending Himself against the accusation that His 
healings are the work of “Beelzebub, the prince of the 
devils.” In thus defending Himself, He does not deny 
that Satan sometimes heals, when it suits his purpose to do so. 
He appears rather to confirm this—‘‘If I by Beelzebub cast 
out devils, by whom do your sons cast them out?” ‘Then 
He significantly likens the Devil to ‘“‘a strong man armed” 
who, though he may possess demonic power to cast out 
devils, always uses that power for his own purposes. When 
casting out devils, He does not fight “against himself,” and 
thus “divide” his kingdom. He “keepeth his palace, his 


41Matt. 12:22-30; Luke 11:14-23. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 301 


goods are in peace.” ‘That is to say, there is no strife because 


his healings, help on his kingdom. His house is not 
“divided.” His healings do not create any disturbance 
there. 

“But when a stronger than he shall come upon him, and 
overcome him, he taketh away from him all his armor 
wherein he trusted, and divideth his spoils.” That is to say, 
when one who is all supreme in the spiritual world, the 
eternal antagonist of Satan, achieves “by the finger of God,” 
wonders of physical healing, then the Kingdom of Beelzebub 
is at once in danger and the Kingdom of God is brought 
nigh. “If I with the finger of God cast out devils, no doubt 
the Kingdom of God is come upon you.” ‘The divine king- 
dom, is set over against the satanic kingdom. 

Then we have the central truth of the illustration in the 
twenty-third verse, ‘“He that is not with me is against me; 
and he that gathereth not with me scattereth.” ‘This is the 
same as to say that the only kind of healings which count 
with God are those wrought by Christ, or those done in His 
name, and all the seeming benefits that appear to come to 
“him that gathereth not with me’—with Christ—are no 
benefits at all, for in reality such gathering is only scattering 
—“He ... scattereth.” 


Satanic Healings and Parabolic Imagery 

All of which is confirmed by the verses immediately fol- 
lowing, where we are told how a man, out of whom an un- 
clean spirit had departed, might find himself in a seven- 
fold more miserable plight than he was before. ‘The un- 
clean spirit here referred to was probably some demon who 
made his possessor both loathsome to himself and despicable 
to others. Doubtless in leaving he was acting under Satanic 
authority, for, speaking exactly, he was not “cast out,” he 
had “gone out,” presumably for the same reason he had gone 
in. We then see this man in the imagery of a “house’— 
still the Devil’s house, mind—“swept,” “garnished,” and as 


302 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


St. Matthew adds, “empty.” Symbols surely of that im- 
provement by “dead works” and worldly polish which breed 
pride, while at the same time there is that emptiness of the 
Holy Spirit which involves spiritual death. After this we 
see the unclean spirit exercising, when it suits his purpose, 
the same power to return into this man—‘“his house”—as he 
manifested in leaving it, but finding it possible now, since 
self-righteous pride had prepared the way, to take “seven 
other spirits . . . more wicked than himself,” so that “the 
last state of that man is worse than the first.” All this shows 
how the Devil’s plan of reformation, both by healing the 
body and beautifying the soul, while fighting against the 
regenerating work of the Holy Ghost, gives him a firmer 
grip upon his victims. But in all this there is not the slight- 
est reference to war. The “strong man armed” is Satan, the 
“stronger than he” is the Lord Jesus; the forces attacked 
are demons and the weapons used are spiritual. 

The same is true concerning the objects the Lord 
employed in His parables and illustrations. We have the 
good seed and the tares, the mustard tree, leaven, hidden 
treasure, the pearl, the net, the fig tree, seats at feasts, sup- 
pers, a tower, lost sheep and a lost coin, vineyards, pounds, 
talents, the rejected stone, the marriage feast, and the wed- 
ding garment,’ but among them all I can find only the two 
references to any army or to force above mentioned. This is 
the more suggestive when we recall the fact that the Saviour 
was King of God’s conquered and subjected people, and He 
was surrounded on every hand by boastful, splendid exhibi- 
tions of the military conquests and glory of Rome. 


The Good Samaritan and the Thieves 
When we look more closely into the teaching of these 
parables we find that they indicate an entirely different 
method, for the advocacy of righteousness and the Gospel 
in this age, to that of coercion. ‘Take the parable of the 


.,, 1 have not thought it needful to give the Scripture reference for these 
illustrations, as they can be found in any list of the parables. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 303 


Good Samaritan. There is no suggestion of any duty in the 
direction of pursuing the thieves, that any one owed to the 
robbed and injured man. Nothing is said about any “ven- 
geance” which was to requite the wrongs of this traveler 
or any effort to get back his goods. We are not told that 
the Good Samaritan felt it his duty even to report this high- 
way robbery to the authorities. All the attention is centered 
on the exercise of loving and merciful deeds from a generous 
spirit. “The heart of the Samaritan was moved with com- 
passion toward the sufferer, not with anger toward the in- 
flicter of his sores.* 

The saving power illustrated in the parables is never 
force. It is rather the principle of growth, persuasion, at- 
traction. ‘Thus we see the fig tree planted in the vineyard of 
a certain man whose “dresser” is busy digging about the 
roots and who is inducing it to bear fruit by fertilizing the 
soil.2 Or we see a great supper prepared by another cer- 
tain man who sent forth his servants—not his soldiers—at 
supper time to say to them that were bidden ‘“‘come’”—not 
“Go”—*“for all things are ready.”* Again we see the shep- 
herd seeking the sheep which was free to wander over the 
wilderness if it chose, not the keeper, mounting guard over 
a caged and confined flock.* In the story of the Prodigal 
Son and the Unforgiving Brother we see the Father “hav- 
ing compassion” on one and “entreating” the other. ‘There 
is no exercise of domineering paternal severity.5 And it is 
virgins who are made to watch for a bridegroom going to a 
marriage, not sentinels or outposts who wait for a relieving 
host.® 

In respect to the emphasis they place upon internal im- 
pulse and never external enforcement, as the saving princi- 
ple which God has chosen for this age, the other illustrations 
of Jesus are just as powerful and as beautiful. He told His 
hearers to “consider the lilies’ how they grew. ‘They were 


1Luke 10:33. "Luke 13:8. ®Luke 14:17. ‘Luke 15:4. SLuke 15:20, 28. 
SMatt. 25:1. 


304 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


not things in nature which got their beauty and fragrance by 
energetic toiling and spinning. ‘They were not flowers which 
fought for their existence, they lived out the principle of 
life within them.t' He pointed to the ravens. ‘The ravens 
didn’t even sow or reap or gather into barns.’ 


Anti-War [Illustrations 
Speakng of the relationship of His followers to the world — 
Christ employed illustrations which were equally inappro- 
priate to militarism. He said they were to be, not like unto 
soldiers, girded with weapons, marching out under His com- 
mand to enforce His dominion, but to watching men ready 
with loins girded for a journey, with lamps burning as those 
looking for ‘‘their Lord when He shall return from the wed- 
ding.” The quality which was to commend them to the 
Saviour, was not to be that they were taking part in the 
world’s contentions or trying, even ever so industriously, to 
right its wrongs in ways which He had forbidden, but that 
all their doings were to harmonize with His Gospel, while 
they were watching and waiting for that summons which 
should call them to leave it altogether for a time, in order 
that they might be united with their King in the heavens, 
with Whom they should return to bring about its final re- 
demption.* And so it is not the picture of the soldier but the 
steward which Jesus portrays as the pattern for those in His 
church. ‘The steward set over the household, not furious 
and terrible, but “faithful and wise,’ not endeavoring by 
the compulsion of law to establish a material kingdom of © 
God on earth during the absent Christ, but giving the por- 
tion of spiritual “meat”? which a true understanding of the 
times and the seasons call for—‘Blessed is that servant, 
whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing.” 
Then there is the other picture of the “servant” who in 
his heart has lost faith in his lord’s return, and as a conse- 
quence takes the affairs of the household entirely into his 


‘Luke 12:27. *Luke 12:24. ‘Luke 12:35-37. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 305 


own hands, resorting to forbidden measures of force by 
“beating” the men and the maidservants, and as a further 
result centers his hopes only on material means: on earthly 
eating and drinking and otherwise drifts into the intoxicating 
pleasures and preoccupations of this age.* 

Again, how delightfully suggestive of love and peace are 
the symbols employed by Jesus to convey His relationship 
to His Church and a lost world. He is “the light” of the 
world?; the “door of the fold’*; the ‘‘way, the truth, the 
life.”* Not as a hero gathering His legions and spoiling for 
a fight, but ‘‘as a hen gathereth her brood under her wings,” 
so He came to gather, and would still gather His erring 
people.® He is “the wine” of which they are ‘‘the branches,’® 
the “good shepherd” and they “the sheep’’;’ the “Bride- 
groom’ of the “bridechamber” of which they are the “chil- 
dren.’® ‘There is nothing in all these of war. No sugges- 
tion of a policy which achieves its end by deceit and 
slaughter. 


1Luke 12:45, 46. 7John 8:12. "John 10:7. ‘John 14:6. [SLuke 13:34. 
John 15:5. ‘John to:11. ®Mark 2:19. 


Ill. THE WORKS HE PERFORMED AND THE 
POLICY HE LAID DOWN 


Again consider the works of Christ and see how, in their 
very nature, they are the reverse of the activities and results 
of war. His whole life is one long record of deeds of for- 
bearance, tenderness, mercy. He went about doing things 
which were exactly the opposite of the acts which generals 
and soldiers go about to perform. He healed the lame; 
while war fills the earth with cripples. He gave the blind 
their sight; while war consigns tens of thousands to total 
darkness. He cured the paralyzed; while war shatters the 


nerves and unseats the reason. ‘The fever-stricken were re-. 


stored by His touch; while war has destroyed more by fever 
than by fire. By His Word the devil-possessed were set free 
from bondage; while war has opened the way for more 
devils to enter the hearts of men than any other agency. 
And remember, these works which Jesus did are to be the 
works of His followers, for He Himself said, “Verily, verily 
I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do 
shall he do also.’”2 


“Lambs in the Midst of Wolves” 


Every honest student of Christ’s policy for His Church as 


explained and expounded by His teachings, must admit 
that there was nothing in any of it akin to the policy of 
War Offices or Admiralty Lords. Here once again His 
teaching was exactly the opposite to that of all fighting men. 
In all His words concerning the character of, and the con- 
duct by which His people were to achieve their victories, 
we see again emphasized the importance of the spirit of low- 
liness—"Come unto me ... for I am meek and lowly in 
heart”*——“‘Behold, I send you forth as lambs in the midst 


1John 14:12. *Matt. 11:28. 


306 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 307 


of wolves.” His was a policy of long suffering patience. 
He forbade a rude uprooting of the “tares,” for He knew 
that would do the wheat as much harm as the weeds— 
“Let both grow together,” He said, “till the harvest.”2 His 
also was a policy of universal love. As the “Son of man” 
He stood in the same relationship of Saviour, brother, friend 
to all men. By His teaching, therefore, the very ground of 
international strife was removed—‘“‘God so loved the 
WORLD.” ‘There was nowhere on this globe any who 


were “foreigners” to His purpose or “aliens” to His mercy. 


And just as clearly and certainly did He insist upon a 
policy of non-resistance, of ‘“‘overcoming evil with good,” 
of triumph over doubt, suspicion and hate by the power of 
love. He Himself so loved that He gave and gave to His 
enemies even to His life-blood, and He called on His fol- 
lowers to do the same.* He told His servants not to resist 
him that is evil;° to turn the other cheek to the smiter;® to 
let the cloak go with the coat rather than go to law about it;7 
to yield to the exorbitant demand on one’s labor and go with 
the extortioner two miles for the one he demanded;® to 
insure against imposition by the exercise of a free generosity 
rather than by a refusal to give or lend;® to conquer enemies 
by loving them;?° to disarm persecution by prayer ;1" to tri- 
umph over an oft repeated wrong by forgiving it even 
though it should be repeated and repented of seven times in 
a day ;** “Then came Peter to Him and said, Lord, how oft 
shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till 
seven times? Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee 
Until seven times; but, Until seventy times seven.”** And 
that there may be no possible mistake about the importance 
which Christ attached to the policy of meeting wrong with 
mercy He says, “For if ye forgive men their trespasses, 
your heavenly Father will also forgive you.”4 


1Luke oF 3. *Matt. 13:29, 30. *%John 3:16. ‘Rom, 5:8 Syele 5:39. 
Matt. $339 TMatt. 5:40. ®Matt. 5:41. °Matt. 5:42 att. 5:34 Matt. 
5344. Luke 17:4. ‘Matt. 18:21, 22. Matt. 6:14. 


308 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Let any statesman stand up in any legislative assembly of 
the world, and attempt to apply a policy of that kind for 
the treatment of an offending “foreign” nation, and see 
where he will land! ‘The general who, supported by a 
thousand guns and a quarter of a million bayonets, goes forth 
to “avenge a wrong” or “destroy an oppressor” or “defend 
a nation” or progress the cause of “democracy” by fire and 
sword, by lying strategy and paralyzing terror, must forever 
disavow the policy of Christ. 

Moreover, Christ’s policy struck at the roots of that “pride 
of life,” that love of earthly possessions which, either directly 
or indirectly, is the cause of all wars. “This is shown in 
the passage already quoted—‘“So therefore whosoever he be 
of you that renounceth not all that he hath, he cannot be 
my disciple.” It was he who was willing to lose his life. 
for Christ’s sake who should find it.2 He forbade any 
anxious thought for the morrow ;* and He discouraged a lay- 
ing up of treasure on earth,* centering rather our energies on 
making purses “which wax not old, a treasure in the 
heavens.’’> It is quite impossible to imagine the Lord Jesus, 
even for all the gold or pearls or territory in this world, 
taking the life of one little child. 


Things of Cesar and Things of God 
Christ’s policy placed the law and the interests of the 
Kingdom of Heaven above the statutes and welfare of all 
earthly kingdoms. His children were to seek that kingdom 
first even when such devotion involved disobedience to the 
commands of earthly rulers, and if they were faithful in 

this respect all things should be added to them.® 
Again, the policy of Jesus Christ so distinguished between 
the Christian’s obligation to earthly things and heavenly 
things, as to make war impossible for him. ‘The things 
that appertained to Cesar could be given to Cesar, but or 
no consideration was the follower of Christ to render to 


4Luke 14:33. Matt. 10:39. *%Matt. 6:34. ‘Matt. 6.19. ‘Luke 12:33. 
Matt. 6:33. : 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 309 


Cesar the things that belonged to God. ‘Things that be- 
longed to men, like coin, the flags, which go before men to 
battle, and other earthly treasures, which do not bear the 
superscription of Christ, but of this world (His insignia is 
not the lion, the unicorn, the eagle, the bear, but the lamb, 
the dove), these things might be given to men, for they bore 
their superscription and image, but the things which be- 
longed to the immortal spirit, bore the image and superscrip- 
tion of God, and must be given only to Him.t The spirit 
of man, made and maintained only by its Creator, must be 
dispatched only by Him Who gave it, to Whom it must 
return.” Christ’s policy placed the spiritually dead in a 
totally different sphere to those who had experienced the new 
birth. He said, “Let the dead bury their dead.’”’ In other 
words, “Let the godless nations, already ‘dead in trespasses 
and sins,’ part of that world system which ‘lieth in wicked- 
ness *—settle their own disputes; be sure you don’t quarrel 
with Me by resorting to methods which I have forbidden, in 
order to help them straighten out their grievances with each 
other; you are—‘alive unto God’—in a higher sphere—‘go 
thou and preach the kingdom of God.’”* And concerning 
the ultimate success of His policy of grace and good-will, He 
attested it when He emphasized the failure of all other meth- 
ods.” Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?’® 
He asked. In other words, “Can you get blessing and peace 
and love by revenge and murder and bloodshed? Good- 
will is not brought to the world by gun-firing, but by the 
proclamation of the Gospel.” ‘The POLICY, then, laid 
down by the Lord Jesus was distinctly anti-war. 


1Luke 20:24, 25. *Deut. 32:39. 1 Sam. 2:6. °%1 John 5:19. *Luke 9:60. 
5Matt. 7:16. Luke 6:44. 


IV. THE INJUNCTIONS HE UTTERED AND 
THE REPROOFS HE ADMINISTERED 


The Lord Jesus boldly attacked the FEAR which has so- 
often destroyed men’s better judgments, and at the impulse 
of which they have rushed into all kinds of anger-invoking 
“preparedness.” He strove to teach His disciples, and 
through them His Church, that the power of man was as 
nothing compared with the forces of the Devil—‘Be not 
afraid of them that kill the body ... fear him who is able to 
destroy both soul and body in hell.”’* ‘That is to say, 
“Don’t be afraid of the Germans, the English, the French, 
the Austrians, the Americans; beware of that paralyzing 
fear of the ‘foreigner’ which makes a Christian a COWARD 
and a murderer.” Jesus told His followers to expect ill- 
treatment and injustice at the hands of apostate Church 
leaders as well as earthly rulers, and exhorted them not to 
be “anxious,” for both words and influence should be given 
them by the Holy Spirit.2 He bid them go cheerfully, fear- 
lessly, confidently, to face the tribunals of this world. 


Malice Worse than Misfortune 

The reproofs of Jesus are still more condemnatory of the © 
retaliatory spirit of war. ‘The injustice which the young 
petitioner pleaded against his elder brother was, in Christ’s 
sight, a small matter compared to the spirit of covetousness, 
which He knew was just as strong in the breast of the one 
who was appealing to Him as it was in his robber-brother. 
“Man, who made me a judge or a divider over you?” ‘That 
is to say, “Such judgments as you seek at my hands do not 
at all concern me. Beware of covetousness, which engenders 
injustice and strife.”* This rebuke is just as applicable to 
nations, whose warrings have so frequently been caused by 


1Matt. 10:28. *Luke 12:11, 12. *%Luke 12:13, 14, 15. 
310 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 311 


covetousness. Again the tremendous rebuke of Christ to 
those who made His Father’s house a “den of thieves,’ is 
just as applicable to those who today desecrate the Church 
by making it a preaching station, in the interests of temporal 
nations, for a gospel of revenge and a recruiting office for 
armies and navies, which are busy doing just everything 
Jesus forbids His children to do. Nor must we forget the 
rebuke of the resurrected Lord, which He administered to 
His disciples because they had failed to understand how He 
should triumph, not with the sword and spear of a Joshua, 
but by the suffering of the cross—‘‘Oh foolish men, and 
slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! 
Behooved it not the Christ to suffer these things and’”— 
when the suffering was accomplished—then “‘to enter into 
His glory?”? You see, then, as now, it was exactly this 
“suffering” the leaders of the Church either did not under- 
stand or denied. ‘To these same deluded shepherds of His 
flock, who thought they could best rid the world of Him 
Who they mistook for their enemy—as many suppose they 
can best dispose of their enemies today—by the process of 
killing—to these He said, “Ye are of your father the Devil, 
and the lusts of your father it is your will to do. He was a 
murderer from the beginning.’® And how sharp an antith- 
esis to the spirit of war is that vivid picture of the unfor- 
giving servant, cast at the last judgment to the tormentors, 
because he forgave not the debt of his fellow-servant, and 
the lesson of which is summed up in the startling sentence— 
“So shall also my heavenly Father do unto you, if ye forgive 
not every one his brother from your hearts.”* Certainly the 
injunctions and reproofs of Jesus were against war. 


1Matt. 21:12, 13. *Luke 24:25, 26. *John 8:44. ‘Matt. 18:35. 


V. THE GOSPEL HE PREACHED AND THE 
CONDUCT HE CONDEMNED 


It is surely unnecessary to do more than mention this fact. 
The Gospel is the “good news” of God’s fathomless love to 
man. Love unmerited, love despised, love spurned, love 
poured out superabundantly from the mighty heart of a 
benevolent Father. Love showing its pity and power to lost. 
mankind, not by driving them by the might of resistless 
force to surrender and obedience, but by a postponement of 
the “Day of Vengeance” in order that all who will, by the 
exercise of their free choice, may win those places of honor 
and authority in the coming kingdom, which can be given 
alone to those who choose, without coercion, to follow the 
Lamb, “‘whithersoever He goeth.” Hence, the great Father 
meets the world’s rebellion and wickedness by the gift of His 
own Son, by Whose humility we are exalted, by Whose 
wounds our transgressions are covered and by Whose stripes 
on Calvary we are healed. There was no force but the force 
of attraction, creating the impulse which results from an 
inward change of heart. 

Who that values his conscience can stand by the Cross of © 
the Saviour in the hour of His utmost humiliation—His im- 
measurable suffering—and hear Him crying there, from those 
lips which shall soon judge the world, “Father, forgive 
them’; who with such a scene and such a sound in his mind 
can be honest with his own heart, and go forth to avenge, 
to destroy, to kill? A battery of modern guns alongside the 
Saviour’s cross on the hill of Golgotha would have mocked 
every sacred act in that tragedy of love, that spectacle of 
divine grace, which has done more to transform the world 
than all the ingenious fury of all the generals who ever 
lived. And never forget that “God commendeth His own 

312 





THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 313 


love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ 
died for us.” While, then, it is true that the Gospel 
preached by Christ ever emphasized the fatal and inevitable 
consequences of sin, while it pointed to the final judgment 
which shall, at the end of life’s probation and at the close 
of this dispensation, come upon the transgressor, yet it was 
a gospel which had nothing in it, while this Day of Grace 
endures, which would justify war for the Christian. 


Christ Condemns War’s Accompaniments 

The conduct which the Saviour condemned is also an argu- 
ment against war for the Church. He condemned anger 
without cause.* He denounced war by condemning that 
anger in the breast without which it is impossible to do 
effective killing. Nowhere in the world is there so much 
anger without just cause as on the battle-field. The men 
opposing each other have often no reason to strike but the 
fear of being struck. ‘The bitter hatred, the passion en- 
gendered in these wars, is bred in the heart as the immediate 
result of fighting. 

Jesus condemned worship without forgiveness. The idea 
of worshiping Him Who had freely forgiven His murderers, 
while all the time intending to slay one’s brother, was an 
abomination in His sight: ‘First be reconciled to thy 
brother and then come and offer thy gift.’ 

Jesus condemned the taking of oaths. But all soldiers are 
“sworn in,” and when in, they “swear” to absolute obedience, 
so that their consciences have neither play nor sway. But 
the Lord said, ‘Swear not at all.’’4 

Jesus condemned the love of money and the hoarding of 
wealth, and it would be difficult to find a war in history, 
outside the Jewish nation, which had not been caused by 
financial interests in one form or another. Even the much 
boasted wars for “liberty,” like that of the American Revolu- 
tion, started over commercial disputes. Moreover, the few 


4Rom, 5:8. *Matt. 5:22. *Matt. 5:24. ‘Matt. 5:34. 


314 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


wars that did not start for money have always been ma- 
neuvered by moneyed men. Christ said, “How hard is it for 
them that trust in riches to enter into the kingdom of God,”? 
and “lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth.” 

Jesus condemned impurity. ‘Do not commit adultery’— 
“Everyone that looketh ... to lust . . . hath committed.’’* 
But war has always filled the world with lust, and as I have 
already shown, has, more than any other thing, brought 
womanhood to shame and degradation. 

Jesus condemned an unbelieving heart and a “doubtful 
mind,” which prompts men, through fear of privation, to 
resort to all kinds of brute force for self-protection. He 
warned us against this as the custom of “the nations of the 
world.’”* 

Jesus condemned lying and stealing and killing. He said, 
“Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness.’”® 
No war could continue a day without the doing of all these. 

Jesus condemned those who heard His words and did not 
do them. Nor did He forget to lay particular stress on the 
kind of words He referred to. They were, “THESE words 
of mine,” the words found in the fifth, sixth and seventh 
chapters of Matthew’s Gospel—‘‘Everyone that heareth 
THESE words of mine, and DOETH THEM NOT, 
shall be likened unto a foolish man, who built his house 
upon the sand... and great was the fall thereof.’® | 


1Mark 10:24. ?Matt. 6:19. *%Matt. 5:28. ‘Luke 12:29, go. 
STuke 18:20. *Matt. 7:26, 27. 


VI. THE SERVICE HE DEMANDED AND THE 
PLAN HE EXPLAINED 


The service which Christ enjoined upon His Church was 
also repugnant to militarism. He sent His disciples, not to 
overbear and terrorize like wolves, but to overcome the 
world’s brutality by the gentleness of the sheep and the 
lamb. “Go ye,” He said, “and make disciples” not soldiers, 
“baptizing . . . teaching them to observe all things whatso- 
ever I commanded you’*—not compelling. And to assure 
them of the effectiveness of this policy, He tells them that 
“all authority” was given unto Him who had set for them 
the supreme example of meekness, and that none other than 
He Himself, in all His sweet tenderness, boundless patience 
and forgiving love was “with them always.”? The first 
salutation they gave to every house they entered was to be 
“peace.”* And when they were rejected and ill-treated, they 
were never to retaliate or even denounce, but shake off the 
dust from their feet, as a witness against God’s enemies 
for that day when the Lord should come to punish those 
who refused His Gospel.* 


These disciples were to be “fishers” of men—not fighters.® 
They were to save their own souls by “enduring” wrong, by 
suffering even to “the end”—not by contending for their 
rights and crushing their enemies.° They were chosen and 
appointed that they should “bear fruit’”’’—a natural process 
working from within, not to capture cities by force of arms, 
or any other kind of force, which would be an artificial 
process working from without. ‘Their service was to be a 
love manifested toward their neighbors even as their self- 
love was manifested toward themselves. ‘They were to be 


1Matt. 28:19, 20. 2Matt. 28:18, 20. ‘*Luke 10:5. *Matt. 10:14. 
SMark 1:17. ®Matt. 10:22. TJohn 15:16. SLuke 10:27, 28. 


315 


316 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


witnesses telling out the truth—not warriors wielding the 
sword. If necessary, they were cheerfully to give that 
greatest of all evidence of true devotion to their “friend” 
Jesus, as also to those around them, by laying down their 
lives in a cause which was for the highest and best interests 
of the world.? 


“In Your Patience Ye Shall Win” 

As far as the hearts of His disciples and the ears of His 
congregations were able to receive it, Jesus explained not 
only His Gospel, but His and His Father’s PLAN. This 
plan comprised the redemption of His people, the establish- 
ment of His Church, the universal dispensation of His grace, 
the resurrection, rapture and reward of His chosen ones, 
His second coming and millennial reign, the last judgment 
of the wicked and the ultimate bliss of the saints. This 
teaching put all war for His people only where it belongs— 
back under the old Jewish Dispensation and forward in the 
day of the Lord’s vengeance and authority. It precluded 
militarism entirely from the Church’s struggle with the 
powers of evil during this age. So far as His auditors had 
“ears to hear,” He explained all this and He promised that 
the ‘Comforter’ would make clear to them “the things that 
are to come.’® Jesus, although He found His chosen peo- 
ple helplessly under the heel of a mighty heathen power, 
never once even suggested their resorting to force in order 
to shake off that “‘tyranny.”’ On the contrary, He predicted 
the doom of their nation, the utter destruction of Jerusalem 
and her proud temple. In striking words He pictures the 
great armies which should come against her, and contrasts 
them with the persecuted and suffering little flock of His 
New Testament Church, making no attempt even at self- 
defense, but forsaking their homes and fleeing to the moun- 
tains, and He closes this description with the significant 
words “in your patience’—not your brave resistance, but “in 


1Acts 1:8. *John 15:13, 14. "John 15:26; 16:7, 13, 14. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 317 


your patience ye shall win your souls.”! Nor must we for- 
get that, many years afterwards, St. John, writing to the 
persecuted early Christians, speaks of himself as their com- 


panion “in tribulation and in the kingdom and patience of 
Jesus Christ.” 


Quite contrary all this to the idea of a metropolis, the seat 
of His government and the home of His representatives, who 
should go forth to subdue the world by armed hosts and in- 
vincible navies. He speaks of Jerusalem as a city which 
should be “trodden down of the Gentiles until the time of 
the Gentiles be fulfilled.”? He foresees a Church which 
should go a whoring with the world and of which only a 
remnant, a “little flock,” should be left whose zeal and de- 
votion shall inherit the coming kingdom.‘ 


Christ’s Plan and Christ’s Power 

Concerning the dispensation which He had come to com- 
plete and to close, He gave utterance to expressions which 
are also exceedingly strong denunciations of war. His 
Sermon on the Mount, with its repeated, “Ye have heard” — 
“But I say unto you,” shows how completely changed was 
to be the method of His Church from that of the Jewish 
kingdom. Surely He showed how “the law was given by 
Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.’ 

Then looking forward, Jesus spoke of that coming mil- 
lennial kingdom which is to be no longer in “mystery” or in 
spiritual form, but established as a tangible material fact 
in this world when He said, “Henceforth ye shall see the 
Son of man sitting at the right hand of power, and coming 
in the clouds of heaven.”* ‘That is the kind of “power” Jesus 
will manifest. It will be a heavenly power, not the power 
of munition factories. Well may we repeat the prayer He 
put into our lips, “Thy kingdom come,”? and equally well 
must we remember that until it comes we are to rely on no 


tLuke 21:8-19. Rev. 1:9. *Luke 21:24. ‘Luke 12:32. ‘John 1:17. 
®Matt. 26:64. ™Luke 11:2. 


318 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


methods but the methods of grace and persuasion in winning 
men to its standard. 

How the Lord’s dispensational teaching broke down those 
barriers between nations which have been so fruitful a source 
of wars is shown by His dealings with the Samaritan woman 
at the well, who could not understand His asking any favors 
of her, since He was a Jew. He tried to explain to her that 
if only her mind was enlightened to know “the gift of God,” 
and how that He who at that moment stood in her presence 
was not only the Messiah of the Jew but the Saviour of 
the whole world; Whose sacrifice was to make all the nations 
of the earth to participate alike in Jehovah’s blessings; if 
she could grasp this, she would then understand that the 
true worshipers would not be bound to any national center 
for their devotions, but would be equally accepted of God 
wherever they knelt to pray so long as they worshiped in 
“spirit and in truth.’ 

The Gospel, then, which Jesus preached to that woman 
destroyed forever that false “patriotism” which is only an- 
other word for pride of earthly breeding, and which is so 
often a prop for Christless thrones. It is quite certain, so far 
as I can discover from the Bible, that Christ’s teaching con- 
cerning the plan of the ages sets aside all carnal war for the 
Christian in this Church age. 


John 4:9, 24. 


te > i 


Vil. THE ENDOWMENTS HE BESTOWED 
AND THE COMFORTER HE PROMISED 


Foremost among these was PEACE. “Peace be unto 
you” was His oft-repeated salutation.1 The prophecy of the 
aged Zacharias when he said that Jesus came “to guide our 
‘feet into the way of peace,” was abundantly fulfilled in 
Christ, and the angles at Bethlehem sang of Him truly when 
they proclaimed Him as the bringer of “peace among men in 
whom he is well pleased.”* “Peace,” He said, “I leave with 
you ; my peace I give unto you.”* And He further explained 
that it was not peace which came by the world’s contrivances 
or policies, for the world could not give it any more than 
take it away. It was His peace, the peace that reigned in 
His own heart when He was martyred while refusing to de- 
fend Himself, and which He knew He alone could bring 
to the nations of this world when He came to rule them: 
“These things have I spoken unto you, that in me ye may 
have peace.”> ‘True, Jesus said He came “not to give peace 
in the earth . . . but rather division.”’® But this “division” 
was not a matter of strife, blows, bitterness, on the part of 
His own, but rather an exclusion which came upon them 
because of their refusal to join in those schemes of worldly 
aggrandizement which led to the world’s contentions; aye 
often because of their repudiation of exactly such methods as 
war for settling them. It was the “division” between the 
spirit of truth and the falsity of the world we see every- 
where manifested in people, Churches and homes, and which 
brings upon Christ’s faithful ones the persecution He told 
them they were never to respond to by retaliation. Peace of 
heart, peace of mind, peace of spirit, were God’s richest en- 
dowments to His people, and certainly no such peace can be 
possessed while engaging in the rage and ruin of war. 


*John 20:19. Luke 24:36, *Luke 1:70. %Luke 2:14 R. V. ‘John 14:27. 
SJohn 16:33. *Luke 12:51. 


319 


320 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Moreover, the peace of the Christian’s life and spirit is 
entirely dependent upon obedience to the words and unity 
with the presence of Jesus. ‘These things have I spoken 
unto you that in me ye may have peace.” The “things” that 
Jesus ‘‘spoke” to His disciples forbid war, and to go aveng- 
ing, smiting, killing one’s enemies is to go precisely in the 
way where Christ cannot go with us. The Christian who, 
having the light, ventures to do this may be certain of losing 
“the peace of God, which passeth all understanding.” 


Equipment 

Jesus told His disciples that before starting on their cam- 
paign in the world they were to tarry at Jerusalem? and 
get what military men would call their “equipment.” But 
this “equipment” affords one more startling contrast to the 
kind of “equipment”? with which modern bishops, and many 
other “up-to-date” Christian leaders are urging young men 
to arm themselves today. It was power—not evolved from 
the genius of a Krupp or an Armstrong or a Maxim-Vickers 
establishment. ‘There was nothing about it akin to the ex- 
plosive compounds packed into shells and torpedoes. Jesus 
described it perfectly when He said, “Ye shall receive power, 
after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you.”* And He 
adds suggestively that this “power”? was to make them “‘wit- 
nesses”—not pugilists. It is a striking fact that of all the 
description so far given of the many and diverse forces for 
destruction or aggression by all the military colleges and 
staffs of the warring world, no one has said a word about the 
power of the Holy Ghost. Yet Jesus and His apostles put 
that power first as the all-essential of effective service in His 
warfare. It would seem that the Church is fully conscious 
of the essential antagonism between the blessed Spirit of 
the promised Comforter, which breaks men’s hearts, and 
changes their dispositions, and the chemical compounds of 


1Phil. 4:47. Acts 1:4. *Acts 1:8. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 321 


war laboratories, which tear off their heads and shatter their 
limbs. Hence, there is little said about the Holy Ghost on 
the battle-fields) The power which Jesus promised His 
people was not a force for insisting on a hateful submission 
but to invoke a willing obedience, not to compel but to con- 
vince. “Lhe Comforter to be sent was “the Spirit of truth” 
—the truth which Jesus said should make men “‘free.”? 
Jesus told His disciples most distinctly that when they were 
persecuted, as they would be after He left them; when they 
were put out of the synagogues and when their enemies 
would suppose they were pleasing God by killing them, they 
were to rely on the aid—not of Czsar’s legions—but on the 
promised “Comforter.” This Comforter, although He 
might not always work out deliverance for them here below 
would, through their patience and boldness, reprove the 
world of sin, of righteousness and of judgment.? 

And note carefully, that Comforter, Jesus said, was to 
glorify Him. “He shall take of MINE, and shall shew it 
unto you.”*® ‘The Comforter, then, was to confirm the say- 
ings and witness of Jesus among other sayings, “‘these say- 
ings of mine,’ in the Sermon on the Mount. It is then a 
false and lying spirit and not the Spirit of Christ which goes 
with men into the bitter and bloody arena of war. The 
Holy Spirit will not dishonor Christ by having anything to 
do with such a hellish turmoil of hate, terror and murder. 


1John 8:32; 14:26; John 16:13. ?John 16:1-8. %John 16:15. 


VIII. THE KINGDOM HE INTRODUCED 


Once more we discover the fact that in all the Master’s 


teaching about the Kingdom of God—while, in this Church 


age, that kingdom is in its “mystery”! or spiritual period— 
the period when it “‘cometh not with observation” or in 
places where men say, “Lo here! or, lo there!’ but when it 
is “within” the heart?—in all His teachings about the king- 
dom and all His parables concerning it, there is no single 
reference to anything that even suggests physical fighting or 
force. On the contrary, Jesus said in unmistakable language, 
“My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were 


of this world, then would my servants fight, .. . but NOW © 
is my kingdom not from hence.’* ‘The time for that tem- 


poral kingdom had not yet come. 


Though it may involve some repetition, let us look 
again at the parables and illustrations in their direct bearing 
on this kingdom in the soul of man. ‘To explain it we have 
such images as these: “A sower went forth to sow,’* not a 
soldier went forth to fight. ‘“The sower soweth the Word;’”® 
he doesn’t deliver blows. It is “the Word of the king- 


dom’’*—not the interests and powers of earthly realms and 


rulers; and the seed is sown in the heart," in loving persua- 
sion—it isn’t something enforced on the will by mailed war- 
riors. 

Again the kingdom is like unto a man who started an in- 
explicable process of life by sowing good seed, or dropping a 
“grain of mustard seed,” in his field* so that it “should 
spring up and grow,” not as a logical consequence of any 
compelling force, which he himself could bring to bear on it, 
but in such a manner as “he knoweth not how.’ 


1Mark 4:11. *Luke 17:20, 21. *%John 18:36. *Matt. 13:3. SMark 4:14. 
®Matt. 13:19. ‘Matt. 13:19. “Matt. 13:24, 31. *%Mark 4:26, 27. 


322 


i 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 323 


Force Comes When the Lord Comes 

The parable of the wicked husbandmen, which, in its 
primary interpretation, refers to the Jewish priesthood, but 
is just as applicable to the leaders of the apostate church 
of this age, is another anti-military figure. In_ this 
parable the kingdom is likened unto a “householder” who 
“planted a vineyard,”! protected it with a “hedge,” “digged 
a winepress in it, and built a tower, and let it out to hus- 
bandmen, and went into another country’’—‘for a long 
time.”? During this long absence, which represents the 
Church age, we see this “householder” sending his “servants” 
to “receive the fruits’*—not to take them by force, but 
instead of pursuing the policy of the militant churchmen, 
which would have battered down all opposition, seized those 
thieves and put an end to their iniquitous robbery of the 
“husbandman,” we discover it is always the “servants” and 
never the “‘soldiers’” who are sent. We find, moreover, it is 
not these “servants” who use violence and return as con- 
querers, but on the contrary all the violence referred to is on 
the side of the “wicked husbandmen,” while the dutiful 
“servants” submit meekly to “beating,” “wounding,” being 
“handled shamefully,” and finally “killed.” Then we have 
the story of the “beloved Son” who comes, not to “avenge” 
the wrongs of the servants, but to inspire loving “reverence’”’ 
in the hearts even of these murderous usurpers, and who 
allows himself also to be “killed and cast forth.”® Finally 
after this “long time” of patient forbearance, during which 
there is not even a hint of the use of force, there comes the 
moment “when therefore the lord of the vineyard shall 
come,” and these “miserable men” shall be destroyed and 
the vineyard be given to more faithful stewards.° Force 
comes back only when the Lord comes back. 


1Matt. 21:33. Matt. 21:33. *Luke 20:9. *Matt. 21:34. 5Mark 12:6-8, 
Matt. 21:41 (R. V.). 


324 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


The “Marriage Feast” Argument 

It is true that there is just one parable (we must, I think, 
distinguish between parables and illustrations) wherein is 
mentioned a king and his armies, but a thoughtful interpreta- 
tion of it strengthens once more the argument against the 
use of arms, in battle, for the Christian. Let us go carefully 
over it. The Kingdom of Heaven was likened unto “a certain 
king, which made a marriage feast for his son.” Here surely 
is represented the call of the rightful “King of the Jews’ — 
even Jesus. The call is given by the fact of His coming as 
their Messiah to His chosen people. It was an Old Testa- 
ment image, setting forth the condition of things in that 
“overlapping” period which is revealed in Scripture, between 
the close of one dispensation and the beginning of another. 
The “king” was Jesus Himself. The ‘“‘marriage feast” for 
which the ‘“‘oxen” and “fatlings” were killed and all things 
were made “ready,” stands for the “marriage’ or the 
uniting of all those feasts and sacrifices of the Jewish ritual, 
in the one supreme offering which Jesus, “the Lamb of 
God,” made of Himself to emancipate the bodies and souls 
of His people. It was to this feast they were invited to 
“come.” They would not respond to the first invitation 
when Jesus Himself during His lifetime sent forth His dis- 
ciples. Neither would they come after the death and resur- 
rection of the Lord, when, the feast being complete and all 
things “ready,” the door of mercy was still open to them 
and the Apostles and Fathers of the early Church again ex- 
tended that invitation. They “made light of it” and “went 
their ways.” ‘Then their dispensation closed, like all the 
other dispensations, with terrible judgment. The armies of 
Rome were permitted to come and destroy those murderers, 
and “burn up their city.” After this the parable shows us 
the opening of the Church dispensation, whose heralds go 
forth to extend the invitation to the whole world, the “wed- 
ding garment” of Christ’s righteousness being freely offered 
to all who will accept it. But, note again, no force is used 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 325, 


either to bring in the guests or to keep out those who fail 
to attire themselves in the necessary robing. Both ‘“‘good and 
bad” are freely admitted. The discrimination between the 
guests was left until “the king came.’’ It was then the man 
who had not the needed adornment was judged, and even 
then, not by the “servants” but by the king himself, the sen- 
tence being carried out only at His command.* 


“Good and Faithful” not “Valiant and Furious” 

Again the conditions which are to characterize the King- 
dom of Heaven in its “mystery” period, are likened to “a 
man going into another country” who “called his own ser- 
vants and delivered unto them his goods”? and then “went 
on his journey.” During his absence we see these servants 
“trading” with the talents and “after a long time,” which 
again represents the Church age, “the lord of these servants 
cometh”—not his armies—and there is a “reckoning,” or 
casting up of accounts and a statement is produced showing 
how much they had “gained” by this “trading.” But there 
is no account of how much they had conquered by fighting. 
Such an idea does not lend itself to the parable at all. 
“Trading” is not making war. ‘The servants were com- 
mended because they were “good and faithful”—not because 
they were “valiant and furious.” 


The parable of the “pounds” has exactly the same imagery. 
The command to those who received them was, “Trade ye 
herewith till I come;” the account rendered was “what they 
had gained by trading,” and surely it is worthy of careful 
note that the fatal mistake made by the “wicked servant,” in 
this parable, was that he got a wrong estimate of his lord, 
and instead of regarding him as a generous master devoted to 
peaceful “trading” he took him for an “austere man” who 
made a business of “taking up that he did not lay down and 
reaping that he did not sow.” And if war-lords do not do 
exactly this, then they do nothing at all.4 


1Matt. 22:1-14. *Matt. 25:14-30. “Luke 19:12-24, 


326 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


The figures are exactly the same in the parable of the 
“householder” who went out early in the morning to hire— 
not soldiers for an army—but “laborers” for a “vineyard,” 
not one of whom was forced to work. 

Again the characteristics and labors of those who con- 
stitute the spiritual kingdom, and their relations to the world, _ 
are likened unto those who hold ‘“keys’”’—not swords. 
They are to unlock the door not to push people through it; 
they must have, not the spirit of the proud “commander,” 
but of “‘little children,” for “of such” is the citizenship of 
that kingdom.? ‘They are likened to ‘‘ten virgins” with ~ 
burning “lamps,” the wiser half of whom disappear at the 
moment of the world’s darkest ‘“midnight’”*—not warriors 
forging their way with clash of arms to pinnacles of triumph, 
to be flattered for having “won the world for democracy” 
or their “fatherland,” in the earth’s noonday of glory. 


The Fallacy of “Righteous Wars” 

‘That force is not a method of the Church, is shown again 
by the parable of the “three measures of meal’ being 
“leavened” by the influences of evil, not the “leaven” being 
destroyed by the good wholesome “meal” ;> and by the story 
of the “hidden treasure,’® which shows that the attraction 
of that which is esteemed to be “of great price,’ is the 
procedure of the Gospel Age, while the simile of the ‘“‘drag- 
net” shows that the process is not the enforced surrender 
of all, but only a “gathering of every kind,” for the great 
mass, though bad, is to be allowed to remain in the “‘net”’ 
till “the end of the world;” only then the good being sepa- 
rated from the bad. Finally—so far is the teaching of Jesus 
from the idea that the Kingdom of Heaven will be established 
in this age, either by the co-operation of the Church with the 
world in its schemes for better education, or better laws, 
or what it calls its “righteous wars’”—that He gives us not 
the slightest hint that such an era will ever be ushered in by 


1Matt. 20:1. *Matt. 16:19. *%Matt. 19:14. ‘Matt. 25:1. SMatt. 13:33. 
SMatt. 13:44. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 327 


the slow process of “progressive thought,” “‘advanced legis- 


lation,” or “military achievement.” On the contrary, He 
tells us that “as the lightning, when it lighteneth out of the 
one part under the heaven, shineth unto the other part under 
heaven; so shall the Son of man be in his day.’’ After say- 
ing which He adds a significant expression, just as applicable 
to His afflicted Church in this age as to Himself, in the time 
of His humiliation—“But first he must suffer many things 
and be rejected of this generation.’’ 


ALuke) 17:24, 25. 


IX. THE METHODS HE EMPHASIZED AND 
THE TESTS HE APPLIED 


Once more the methods which Jesus adopted for His 
Church give no countenance to compulsion and can never be 
made to justify war. ‘There is no place in them for revenge. 
Judgment is postponed to the close of this Day of Grace. 
Punishment comes only at the end of this age. Christ re- 
minded His disciples that it was the appeal to the heart 
through the ear—not the appeal to the will by means of 
force, which was the method by which they shall know the 
truth—‘“If any man have ears to hear.”* He told them 
that when love failed to stop their enemies’ attacks they 
were to flee—not to fight—‘“Shake off the dust from your 
feet.”2 The early Christians in Jerusalem, when they saw 
the sign of “desolation” in the Temple* and the Roman 
armies closing upon Jerusalem were NOT to join their 
nation’s forces in defense of their “beloved country,” their 
homes and their dear ones. They were to “FLEE”—“Let 
them that are in the midst of her depart out.” ‘Those in 
the country were NOT to answer the summons of their _ 
national leaders to “rally to the standard” in that day of 
sore trial for Jerusalem. It was doubtless considered at the 
time the rankest kind of “unpatriotic” treason to forsake the 
cause and to refuse to do “their bit” in helping to kill the 
accursed heathen, but Jesus told them they were so to act— 
‘Jet not them that are in the country enter therein.”* They 
were to win by “watching” and prayerfulness—“If my 
words abide in you”—mark well the expression, the words 
of Jesus mean much—“ye shall ask what ye will and it 
shall be done unto you.”° “But watch ye at every season, 
making supplications that ye may prevail” (to conquer your 


t1Mark 4:23. *Mark 6:11. *Matt. 24:15. ‘Luke 21:20, 21. 5John 15:7- 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 329 


enemies by physical fighting? No.) but “that ye may pre- 
vail to ESCAPE all these things that shall come to pass and 
to stand before the Son of man.’ ‘They were to push the 
Gospel, not the interest of worldly governments, not the 
tenets of Christless democracies—and teach the Word of 
God. ‘Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to 
every creature’*—‘‘teaching them to observe all things what- 
soever I have commanded you,”* which of course includes 
the Sermon on the Mount. 


Love versus War’s Effects 

The tests Jesus applied are very simple but most emphatic 
and searching. It is only necessary to quote a few of them. 
“Ye are my friends, if ye do the things which I command 
you, * which is another way of saying, “If you do the things 
that I tell you NOT to do ye are my enemies, but Jesus for- 
bid us to kill our brother-man.5 “He that hath my com- 
mandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me... and 
I will love HIM, and manifest myself unto HIM,’ which 
is another way of saying, “Those who make loud professions 
of having me in their hearts while they go down to shed a 
brother’s blood, or support others in doing so, and thus to 
break the commandments which I have given them, do NOT 
know me in the realest and truest sense, and I will NOT 
manifest myself to them. “By THIS shall all men know 
that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another’’— 
that is to say, LOVE is the supreme test of discipleship. 
Where there is no Jove there is no real Christianity. If we 
want to know what real LOVE is we should turn to the 
thirteenth chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians, and 
read it over with the causes and the effects of war in our 
minds as we do so. Here we find that love though it “suffer- 
eth long” does not at last break out in vengeance and murder, 
but still “is kind; love “vaunteth not” about its national 


ILuke 21:36. *Mark 16:15. *Matt. 28:20. ‘John 15:13, 14. 
SMark 10:19 and Luke 18:20. ‘%John 14:21. “John 13:35. 


330 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


greatness and superiority; it does not strut around booted, 
spurred, panoplied, decorated with “puffed up” pride; love 
does not indulge in celebrations of victory by “unseemly” 
orgies of debauchery and drunkenness; she does not 
“seek her own” at all costs and sacrifices, on the principle of 
“my country, right or wrong;” her “dignity,” “honor,” 
“prestige,” is not “easily provoked,” and she does not charge 
her enemy with all kinds of imaginary abominations, for 
she “thinketh no evil.” Nor does she delight in a policy of 
lying and spying, for she “rejoiceth not in iniquity,” but 
prefers at all costs to stand by “the truth.” Love does not 
blaze forth in rage and bombardments, but “beareth all 
things,” she “hopeth all things,” “endureth all things,” and 
last but not least and notwithstanding the Churches’ cow- 
ardly abandonment of spiritual weapons as a cure for Prus- | 
sianism, “Love never faileth.” One needs not then to think - 
below the surface to discover that Christian LOVE and 
WAR cannot go together; and yet we once more repeat that 
Jesus said, “By THIS shall all men know .. . if ye have 
LOVE.” 


4 


X. THE EXAMPLE HE GAVE 


The Lord Jesus ever pointed to His own example as the 
true copy, as regards both character and conduct, for all 
His followers. His oft repeated injunction, ‘‘follow me,” 
given to those with whom He came into contact in the days 
of His flesh, is just as applicable to all of us today. “I have 
given you an example,” He says, “that ye also should do as 
I have done to you.”! Jesus is the example of the Church 
not the Old Testament saints. ‘That is to say, where the 
example of Jesus differs and contrasts with that of the heroes 
of the Jewish Dispensation, we are to follow Jesus and 
NOT those heroes, the last of whom was John the Baptist. 
It is painful to see the way venerable bishops tumble into 
all sorts of confusion over this matter, because they go back 
to such examples as David, who, they remind us, was a 
“man after God’s own heart” and yet used the sword. But 
David had several wives, he ate the passover lamb, kept the 
Jewish feasts and would have laid himself open to the pun- 
ishment of death had he been favored to have an automobile 
and rode it on the Sabbath Day. With a startling incon- 
sistency certain Bible critics of German and English theo- 
logical seminaries defend war by pointing to Elijah, who 
slew the prophets of Baal, a fact which they conveniently 
forget gave them serious offense until they took so vigorously 
to killing each other. ‘These “modern thought” divines must 
have gotten “floods of light” on the much debated “morality” 
of the Bible description of the slaughter of the Amalekites 
since they are now such ardent advocates of wholesale 
slaughter of men, women and children by fire, tempest and 
slow starvation. ‘They ought, then, to publicly apologize to 
the Almighty for criticising His right to slay a bunch, about 
five hundred times more hopelessly given over to crime and 


cruelty, than the worst citizen of either Berlin or London. 
14John 13:15. 


331 


332 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


But to return to the point, Jesus is the only complete and 
authoritative pattern for a Christian. He and not David 
is now the “light of the world.” 

Looking, then, for help from His example concerning this 
great question of war, we can find no single instance when 
any word He ever spoke or any deed He ever committed— 
as the instigator of the Church or the herald of the New 
Covenant—which could give even the faintest suggestion of 
His approval either of the spirit, the methods, or the accom- 
plishments of war. The fact that He predicted wars, 
warned His people to prepare for them, even showed how 
they would be overruled so as to work out, or speaking 
more correctly, so as not to prevent the working out of His 
Father’s plan for this earth, no more proves that He ap- 
proved of them than His prophecies concerning His own 
crucifixion justified the tragedy of murder which did Him 
to death on the cross. 


Cleansing the Temple 

Great teachers of the Bible, as well as leaders of Chris- 
tendom, when driven by stern logic to confusion concerning 
their battle-defending sophistries, have desperately snatched 
from the overpowering multitude of Christ’s war-denounc- 
ing words and deeds the incidents connected with His 
cleansing of the Temple. Quite oblivious of the logical 
application of their argument, they forget that if driving 
desecraters from the Lord’s house with whips was justifiable 
for the present age, not a few whips, or speaking more “on 
time,” not a few six-shooters, in the hands of a very large 
force of men would be needed, and ought to be employed, to 
drive from modern Churches the no inconsiderable number 
of those who run their Christ-dishonoring mummeries, Ro- 
man idolatries, bazaars, and godless entertainments, in these 
so-called “‘sacred” edifices today. 


But what are the facts about the cleansing of the Temple. 
To begin with, it must be a weak argument which is bound 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 333 


to assume that a whole regiment of renegades, grown rich 
and powerful by the lucrative trade they were running, 
could be driven out by a few knotted cords in the hand of 
a single man. No, the knotted cords were surely made for 
the beasts. At the second cleansing of the Temple no men- 
tion is made, by any of the Gospel writers, of this whipping 
at all. It is simply said that “He cast out” the intruders.’ 


The Whip and the Word 

The context in St. John’s description of the first cleansing 
is all in favor of the idea that it was the cattle and not the 
men for whom the “scourge of cords” was made. All the 
physical force was used against the animal and material 
things. The only time the “scourge” is mentioned emphasis 
is put on this. He made a “scourge of cords” and cast all 
out... “both sheep and the oxen.” He “poured out” the 
changer’s “money.” He “overthrew” their “tables.”? But 
when it came to dealing with the men the narrative goes on 
“and to them that sold the doves He SAID, Take these 
things hence.” The whip for the cattle, the “pouring out” 
for the money, the “overturning” for the tables and the 
“speach” for the men. It was the word of His authority 
that cast out these men with living souls, not His insignifi- 
cant whip. This is confirmed by what happened immediately 
afterwards for we read, “The Jews therefore answered and 
said unto Him.” ‘This was certainly not the attitude of a 
lot of whipped and enraged men, deprived of their gains and 
money-making jobs, but it WAS the attitude of those who, 
overawed by some mysterious supernatural power, wanted 
to know something more about it. Hence, the question of 
these expelled tradesmen, ‘““What sign showest thou unto us, 
seeing that thou doest these things?’* In other words, 
“What evidence can you produce that this strange ‘au- 
thority’ to which we have yielded is of God?” Then Jesus 


Matt 21:12, 13. Mark r1:15-18, Luke 19:45, 46. "John 2:14-22. 
8John 2:18, 


334 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


by His reply settles, I think, forever the kind of “force” it 
was He used in cleansing the Temple. Jt was the same 
power that would raise the temple of His own body from 
the grave after it had lain there for its appointed time— 
“Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ 
Now if modern armies could drive before them their enemies 
by the same kind of superhuman power as this, if they 
could raise their dead soldiers to life from the trenches to 
continue fighting their battles, then no Christian could have 
any doubt about joining them. One thing is certain, Jesus 
did not get His authority and power by the use of sixteen- 
inch guns! 


Lord of the Jewish Dispensation | 
But supposing Jesus had employed that whip, so precious 
to the Church-militants, in driving out the men as well as- 
the beasts, how could that justify war for the CHRIS- 
TIAN? Jesus was then acting under the Jewish Dispensa- 
tion as Lord of the Jewish Temple. Until the close of that 
dispensation it was imperative that He should enforce its 
laws, by, in some way, chastizing those who broke them; 
just as it was impossible that the High Priest could insult the 
Shekinah in the Holy of Holies and not suffer for it. To 
use force for such a purpose, by our Lord Himself, was- 
perfectly legitimate in that time, while the Jewish kingdom 
still existed. But Jesus was acting concerning a 
temple which was soon to be utterly destroyed, and 
with the passing of which all that called for “violence” on 
the part of His followers should also pass. No sword till 
God’s appointed time can now defend that Temple, as 
countless lives and treasure beyond estimation, during the 
Wars of the Crusades, have proved. If war for this dis- 
pensation is justified on the grounds that Christ used force 
in cleansing the Temple, then the sword in our time should 
at once be drawn in many cathedrals! 


4John 2:19, 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 335 


Continuing our thoughts on the example of Jesus, looking 
there for light on this great question of war, where do we 
find Him in pursuit of His mission, using other methods 
than His words or the spiritual influences which flowed 
from His person? It was His supreme purpose to proclaim 
the Gospel and to herald the Dispensation of Love—‘“To this 
end have I been born, and to this end am I come into the 
world that I should bear witness unto the truth” #*—not 
that I should “bear the sword for it’—‘bear witness.” “Let 
us go elsewhere,” He said to His disciples, “into the next 
towns, that I may preach there also: for to this end came I 
forth.” ‘He went into their synagogues throughout all 
Galilee, preaching and casting out demons.”* He was not 
a little bit concerned about the casting out of Romans, 
though everywhere His own disciples were appealing to 
Him to proclaim His Kingship and throw off the tyrant’s 
power.® 


Peter and His Satanic Policy 

Yes! the key-note of that wonderful life was LOVE. 
The secret of its power and influence throughout the world 
was patient forbearance—grace poured out upon guilt. It 
was hard for His disciples at the time, even as it is hard for 
many of them today, to understand how this could or can 
be. They cannot see how greater victory is achieved through 
suffering than by fighting. Peter stumbled here. Like so 
many of our time, he did not like to hear his Master, the 
Messiah, the lawful King of a “little nation,’ groaning 
under the bondage of a huge empire, smarting beneath the 
scepter of a relentless emperor; he did not like to hear Him 
talking about the many things He must “suffer’—about 
being “rejected” and “killed,” thus he “rebuked” his Master 
for saying them. In his opinion, it would have been far 
better to get a few swords, start up an insurrection, meet 
force with force, and so ‘‘make the world safe for” theocracy. 


@John 18:37. *Mark 1:38, *Mark 1:39. “*Acts 1:6, 


336 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


But Jesus saw the reasoning of “Satan” in all that. He 
bid him begone—“Thou art a_stumbling-block unto 
me,” He said to Peter, ‘for thou mindest not the things of 
God, but the things of men. ... Whosoever would save his 
life shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life for my 
sake shall find it.’’? 
All through those months of opposition from the ablest 
and most powerful men in His nation, when they sought 
to trap Him, thirsted for His blood, surrounded Him with 
danger, He never resisted—‘From that day forth they took 
counsel that they might put Him to death,” and what did 
Jesus do? Did He start fighting, or organizing others to do 
so, and thus seek by force to prevent their murderous intent? 
No, He simply withdrew—“Jesus, therefore, walked no more 
openly among the Jews.’? On another occasion, when His 
persecutors were hot on His track, Jesus “conveyed Him-— 
self away.’ 


The Worthiest of all Conflicts 

Surely, if war is justifiable at all, there never was, there 
never can be, in all history, a cause half so worthy of war- 
riors as the cause which Jesus Christ came to espouse. Surely 
He, above all others, was the one to fight for. Not only was 
He King and Messiah of His nation, then being enslaved 
and taxed by a huge, unscrupulous heathen power, but He 
was the Creator and Sustainer of all things on this earth, and 
therefore their rightful Owner. Yet, notwithstanding all 
this, Jesus absolutely forbid the use of the sword in His 
defense (see pages 58, 59). He distinctly stated that though 
He might have called more than “twelve legions of angels” 
to protect Him, He refused to do so. He had never a doubt 
that His redemptive work, as His victory in the world, was 
to be achieved by patient endurance of wrong—-by triumph- 
ant forgiving love. 

As He approached His death He hailed it as the supreme 


*Matt. 16:23, 25. "John 11:53, 54. "John 5:13. ‘Matt. 26:53. 


a 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 337 


opportunity for demonstrating the effectiveness of that policy 
—‘The Son of man,” He said, “‘is delivered up to be cruci- 
fied” 1—“‘the hour is come,” He said again to His disciples, 
“that the Son of man should be glorified’’—-glorified by be- 
ing crucified. And when the tramp of His murderers’ feet 
was within hearing He looked into His Father’s face and ex- 
claimed: “Glorify thy Son, that thy Son may also glorify 
thee.” This was the “glory” which was to follow as a 
result of the insult and martyrdom to which He unresistingly 
yielded. 

True the Elders and the Scribes, who, like so many of 
their profession today, could not understand how any great 
catastrophe could be averted or any large achievement 
wrought without a resort to force, spoke more truly than 
they knew when they said, ‘‘He saved others; himself he can- 
not save,’* for it was precisely that policy of patient en- 
durance, both in Himself and in those who followed His 
example, which thrilled and captured the hearts of those who 
established and comprised His Church. Well may the 
Apostle say, “And we beheld His glory,” so unlike the fury 
of emperors and captains, the glory which was “full of 
grace and truth,” 


Extreme Provocation and Supreme Forbearance 


Lastly, think of the example of non-resistance which the 
Lord Jesus gave us during His last hours. Without com- 
plaint, without calling on those unseen forces ever at his dis- 
posal for protection, or the avenging of His wrongs, He bore 
almost every conceivable provocation to anger, hatred, strife 
or war. He was sold to His enemies by one He had loved and 
trusted ;° He was the victim of the most shameful hypoc- 
risy ;' He was betrayed by a kiss;* He was arrested by law- 
less ruffians like a highway robber;? He was unlawfully 
tried ;*° He was the subject of ecclesiastical bigotry and perse- 

1Matt. 26:2. John 12:23. °John 17:1. *Matt. 27:42, ‘John 1:14 


SMatt. 26:14-16. ‘John 18:28. ‘%Matt. 26:49. Luke 22:47-54.  20John 
18:19-23. 


338 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


cution ;** He was lied against by false witnesses ;12 His enemies 
“blindfolded” Him, “scoffed” at Him, “spat in His face;’’% 
He was “scourged,” “buffeted,” insulted and ‘“‘smitten;”+ He 
was denied by one He had most trusted ;! He was the sub- 
ject of “envy”? and sedition,® the victim of a foul con- 
spiracy ;* He was forsaken by His most intimate associates ;° 
He was accused of blasphemy and treason;* they ridiculed 
Him as a false prophet ;’ though the King of Heaven, they 
handed Him over to a heathen power;® they said He was a 
rebel ;? He was made a plaything for kings who “‘set Him at 
naught ;”*° His kingship was rejected ;11 an assassin was pre- 
ferred before Him;?? His royalty was denied;** the mob 
ridiculed Him;** the authorities taunted Him;** they op- 
pressed Him with an unbearable burden;'® they stole His 
belongings ;*7 laughed at His agonies'® and finally they in- 
flicted on Him the most shameful death—a penalty meted 
out only to the lowest criminals.!® 
All this the Lord Jesus endured unresistingly. 


Why Did not Jesus Fight? 

Should it be said that the reason He did this was because 
He could not otherwise have carried out His redemptive 
work for the race—that His policy of non-resistance being 
essential to His work of atonement, does not therefore apply 
to us—it is sufficient to answer such an argument with a 
very pertinent question. Was this non-resistance really 
essential to Christ’s atoning work? True He had to die in 
order to save us, but why did He choose to die unresistingly? 
Why could He not have died resisting? He was not com- 
pelled to employ those divine superhuman powers with 
which, by virtue of His Godhead, He was invested, and 
which, had He used them would have rendered His murder 


aratt 14:1. Matt. 26:59, 60. Mark 14:65. Luke 22:63, 64. John 
1-5. Matt. 26:67. 
"oT Mark 14 :66-68. *Mark 15:10. *Luke 23:2. ‘Matt. 27:1. SMark 14:50. 
®Matt. 26:65. "Mark 14:65. *®%Matt. 27:2. 
*Luke 23:2. Luke 23:11. UJohn 19:15. 2Tuke 23:18. 
8 hes 19:2, 3. 4John 19: 5, 6. ‘Matt. 27:42. 6 Fohn 19:17. 
ath.a7, ae. 18Matt. 27, 39. Luke 23:33. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 339 


impossible. He could have fought His enemies to the limit 
of His human powers. He could have put up a splendid 
opposition as a man—a perfect man. He could have led 
His little company against those hypocritical, cowardly 
priests and their hired set of Roman bullies with a leader- 
ship of such courage and skill, blows of such exact precision, 
as could be directed and impelled only by a mind, an eye, a 
spirit which, like His, were unspoiled by sin. Why didn’t 
He fight, then? 

If it is right for His followers to fight for their earthly 
nations, why shouldn’t He have fought for the best of all 
causes? He had it always in His power to stop short of 
winning the victory, so He could still have fought and done 
His Father’s will. He knew His nation would not accept 
Him. He knew that had he decided to do the “heroic” and 
fight, His death would have been doubly sure, for He knew 
that in that case Pilate would have at once crucified Him as 
a rebel against Cesar. So it is certain that had He drawn 
the sword, He could still have redeemed the world by His 
death. Why, then, did he not die fighting? Doubtless He 
understood such a course would be more in harmony with 
the ideas of archbishops and bishops in His professed 
Church today. Didn’t He know that the cathedrals of our 
time would be stuffed full of blood-stained, bullet-riddled 
flags; of monuments, tablets, stained-glass windows, to the 
memories of men who had made their fame by conduct 
which was the very opposite to that of the Apostles and 
“Saints” to whose memory these cathedrals had been built? 
Why didn’t He die fighting instead of yielding? Just as 
many an army colonel has been immortalized because— 
standing in the midst of the remnant of his regiment, in the 
rake of a surrounding enemy’s fire—he had perished with the 
words, “no surrender” on his lips; so Christ could have won 
immeasurably greater fame than any fighting hero had He 
struggled against His murderers till overpowered and then 
employed His waning forces in hurling anathemas from the 


340 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


cross. Such a course would have still made Him the world’s 
bravest hero. Why not? Nelson was a hero; Gordon was 
a hero; Wolfe was a hero; Stonewall Jackson was a hero. 
These all died fighting. More illustrious men than these, 
if they did not die im battle, won their high places in the 
world’s esteem by war. Cromwell, Washington, Lee, Lin- - 
coln. We place wreathes on the monuments of all these 
men. Had Jesus died as a LION instead of a LAMB, 
could we not still have brought our tributes to His cross? 
Why all this meekness, this humiliation, this dove-like sub- _ 
missiveness, this absolute surrender?—Why ? | 


Could we Worship a Pugilistic Christ? 


Is it necessary to answer? Do not our very heart-instincts 
reply? Could our homage ever be given to a pugilistic 
Christ? (pardon the liberties of speech which follow. For 
the logic which necessitates such seeming irreverence I refer 
you to the “state” churches, both “established” and “non- 
conformist” of this generation)—Could our heart’s affec- 
tion be captured by a Christ Who, with clenched fists, red 
with the blood of His enemies, had been the central figure 
in a series of furious scrambles all the way from Gethsemane 
to Golgotha? A Christ Who, when Judas came with his 
infamous kiss, had “knocked his teeth down his throat;” 
Who had “landed” Annas “one in the eye;” had flung the 
court-furniture at the heads of the false witnesses ; “punched” 
Caiphas’ ecclesiastical brow; sent Pilate to the hospital in 
Jerusalem with a broken nose, and, as punishment for their 
insolence to Himself, the Royal One of heaven, in the 
palace of the heathen, had left half a dozen bleeding and 
bandaged soldiers with the city ambulance? 

Could we sing and preach about Christ as we now do 
if, instead of passing up that Calvary’s “way of sorrow” 
with such matchless patience, He had gone there in the man- 
ner our soldiers’ retreat, ‘contesting every inch of the way” 
—‘“‘making his enemies pay dearly”—‘giving ground at a 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 341 


frightful cost in dead and wounded”? Had He held out 
with “frantic struggles” in which He could be discerned 
above all His followers, urging them to thrust with swords, 
stab with knives, strike with staves, pound with fists, hit 
with stones; had He, as opportunity served, with superlative 
vigor, done all this Himself, executing “frightful slaughter 
to the accursed foe;” had all this happened could we love 
Him as we do now? Could we think of Jesus on the cross 
with the same adoration if, landing at the summit of Gol- 
gotha in the midst of this wild and bloody scuffle, He was at 
last overwhelmed “only by the superiority of numbers,” and, 
still screaming “vengeance” on His enemies, was nailed by 
sheer force to His place of sacrifice? 
I trow not! 


A Pattern for the Church 

But this is the image His “modern” apostles have made 
of Him. This is the kind of “heroism” one hears extolled 
ad nauseam from pulpits of today. This is the kind of thing 
young men are urged to go and do. And yet, strange to say, 
those who thus laud such conduct in Christ’s professed fol- 
lowers cannot yet bring themselves to worship such a Christ. 
Mahommed, whose temple at this moment surmounts, in 
Jerusalem, the ruins of the Temple of God, stands in strik- 
ing antithesis both to the character and principles of the Lord 
Jesus. For Mahommed fell back upon the sword as the 
motive power and his religion, and he produced—Mahom- 
medism. Christ relied only upom love, forbearance, for- 
giveness, and He produced—Christianity. 

The reason then for Christ’s submissiveness was because 
He came not only to save the world by His death, but to 
establish His Church by His example. His Church, just 
as His nation, is part of His plan for the redemption of the 
world. His Church is indispensable to that plan. Without 
the Church, the coming kingdom would not be possible. 
But His Church was to be founded and built on the prin- 


342 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


ciples of LOVE, self-sacrifice, patience, faith. ‘These are to 
be the fundamental principles of His coming kingdom. 
‘They are the principles which will guarantee, under His 
rulership, its happiness and success. ‘The reason the king- 
doms of this age are so great a failure, such realms of sor- 
row, tears, death—is because they are controlled by prin- - 
ciples of an exactly opposite nature. Their law is self- inter- 
est, greed, ambition, unbelief. ‘The Lord wants to teach 
His Church that the two greatest things in this world are 
LOVE and TRUST. Where these are, strife cannot exist. 
Where strife is, these are absent. Moreover, love, patient © 
forbearance, unquestioning obedience, humility, long suffer- 
ing—these are qualities the exercise of which, on the part 
of God’s redeemed ones, fit them for those positions of trust 
which in the coming kingdom the Lord Jesus has marked 
out for them. His concern in this Dispensation is to make 
officers for the next. ‘Through this Church age, He is doing 
exactly what the United States Government did prior to 
the mobilization of its new armies. It trained officers. The 
Lord is doing the same. The United States needed men it 
could TRUST for the positions of responsibility in the 
management of its soon-to-be-called-out legions. In the same 
way the Lord Jesus before He calls out and mobilizes His 
hosts for His conquest of the world, seeks for those He can 
trust for the places of power and leadership in His coming 
kingdom. ‘The only way to get trusted men is by festing 
men. Hence, the trial of our faith, by patient endurance, 
is more precious to Him than the finest gold. 


Co-Workers With the Lord 
Remember also that although we cannot in any sense 
share with Christ His atoning work we are called to be 
“workers together with him’ in bringing the blessings of 
that Gospel to the world. This is the express task of His 
Church, and He told us how we were to perform it. In the 


42 Cor.:6, rz. 


THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 343 


mouth of His Apostle Paul He explained how we were ever 
to be—‘“‘approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in 
much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in 
stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in watchings, 
in fastings; by pureness, by knowledge, by long suffering, by 
kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by Jove unfeigned.' In all this 
list there is nothing that suggests “by force.” We are to 
follow the example of the Lord. We shall bring blessings 
to others “‘as the sufferings of Christ abound in us.”? We 
are to know the “fellowship of His sufferings, being made 
conformable unto His death’’® and there is a sense in which 
we with the Apostle Paul may “fill up that which is behind 
of the afflictions of Christ.’’* 

Jesus Himself said that as He was, so are we to be in the 
world, for “the disciple is not above his master, nor the 
servant above his lord.”® And the Apostle Peter most beauti- 
fully points us to Jesus as, “an example, that ye should fol- 
low in His steps. ... Who, when He was reviled, reviled 
not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but com- 
mitted himself to him that judgeth righteously.’® 


And so when the spirit of Jesus passed into the unseen 
His legions of fleshly warriors, clad in steel, panoplied with 
sword and spear, were disarmed and dismissed, and His 
spiritual hosts, clad in the “armor of light,’ armed with 
the weapons of love, were summoned to take their places. 
These hosts do not fight with the reeking accouterments of 
bloody men. The gory sword, the dripping bayonet, are not 
needed by those who oppose, with the sword of the Spirit, 
that unseen principle of hate which, intrenched in the breasts 
of men, makes them snarl at each other. ‘The impulse of 
anger and the blast of dynamite are forces quite foreign to 
those who know the regenerating strength of the Holy 
Ghost—the burning flame of the fire sent down from 
Heaven. No, we are warriors of the Bleeding Lamb—the 


12 Cor. 6:4-6. 42 Cores 1:5. 3Phil. 3:10. 
€Col. 1:24. 5Matt. 10:24. 6; Peter 2:21, 23. 


344 THE SAINT AND THE SWORD 


Lamb slain before the foundation of the world to set men 
free from the tyranny of lust and revenge. We serve under 
the banner stained with the precious blood of Christ—the 
price of peace and good-will among men. We do not have, 
by the assassinating blows of torpedoes, to send thousands 
of souls down to hell, in order that the way to heaven may > 
be made accessible to those left behind. We do not need to 
wear uniforms or the ornaments, which carry along with 
them the stench of human blood, for our breastplate is right- 
eousness, our shield faith, our head-piece the helmet of salva-_ 
tion. Nor have we, as citizens of that kingdom which is 
coming down out of heaven, to go down into the slimy 
abattoir of the murderous world, and sink to the level of 
the scuttle-fish, the skunk and the hyena, to fight our bat- 
tles; ‘for we wrestle not with flesh and blood, but against 
principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the dark- 
ness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high 
places.””+ 

As we seem to discern the advance of the relieving 
heavenly hosts, led on by our blessed Lord, coming for our 
vindication and support—coming to capture and convert 
this old world to His rulership—let us do what we can to 
attack, by a Spirit-filled ministry, these evil powers_in the 
hearts of as many as we can reach, so that, for them at least, 
all war shall cease, since all occasion for it shall have been 
removed. 


1Eph. 6:12. 


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JX1954 .B73 
The saint and the sword; a series of 


Princeton Theologi 





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012 00025 9442 





